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Title: Phineas Finn
The Irish Member
Author: Anthony Trollope
Release Date: April 7, 2006 [eBook #18000]
Most recently updated: June 9, 2010
Language: English
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PHINEAS FINN***
E-text prepared by Joseph E. Loewenstein, M.D.
PHINEAS FINN
The Irish Member
by
ANTHONY TROLLOPE
First published in serial form in _St. Paul's Magazine_ beginning in
1867 and in book form in 1869
CONTENTS
VOLUME I
I. Phineas Finn Proposes to Stand for Loughshane
II. Phineas Finn Is Elected for Loughshane
III. Phineas Finn Takes His Seat
IV. Lady Laura Standish
V. Mr. and Mrs. Low
VI. Lord Brentford's Dinner
VII. Mr. and Mrs. Bunce
VIII. The News about Mr. Mildmay and Sir Everard
IX. The New Government
X. Violet Effingham
XI. Lord Chiltern
XII. Autumnal Prospects
XIII. Saulsby Wood
XIV. Loughlinter
XV. Donald Bean's Pony
XVI. Phineas Finn Returns to Killaloe
XVII. Phineas Finn Returns to London
XVIII. Mr. Turnbull
XIX. Lord Chiltern Rides His Horse Bonebreaker
XX. The Debate on the Ballot
XXI. "Do be punctual"
XXII. Lady Baldock at Home
XXIII. Sunday in Grosvenor Place
XXIV. The Willingford Bull
XXV. Mr. Turnbull's Carriage Stops the Way
XXVI. "The First Speech"
XXVII. Phineas Discussed
XXVIII. The Second Reading Is Carried
XXIX. A Cabinet Meeting
XXX. Mr. Kennedy's Luck
XXXI. Finn for Loughton
XXXII. Lady Laura Kennedy's Headache
XXXIII. Mr. Slide's Grievance
XXXIV. Was He Honest?
XXXV. Mr. Monk upon Reform
XXXVI. Phineas Finn Makes Progress
XXXVII. A Rough Encounter
VOLUME II
XXXVIII. The Duel
XXXIX. Lady Laura Is Told
XL. Madame Max Goesler
XLI. Lord Fawn
XLII. Lady Baldock Does Not Send a Card to Phineas Finn
XLIII. Promotion
XLIV. Phineas and His Friends
XLV. Miss Effingham's Four Lovers
XLVI. The Mousetrap
XLVII. Mr. Mildmay's Bill
XLVIII. "The Duke"
XLIX. The Duellists Meet
L. Again Successful
LI. Troubles at Loughlinter
LII. The First Blow
LIII. Showing How Phineas Bore the Blow
LIV. Consolation
LV. Lord Chiltern at Saulsby
LVI. What the People in Marylebone Thought
LVII. The Top Brick of the Chimney
LVIII. Rara Avis in Terris
LIX. The Earl's Wrath
LX. Madame Goesler's Politics
LXI. Another Duel
LXII. The Letter That Was Sent to Brighton
LXIII. Showing How the Duke Stood His Ground
LXIV. The Horns
LXV. The Cabinet Minister at Killaloe
LXVI. Victrix
LXVII. Job's Comforters
LXVIII. The Joint Attack
LXIX. The Temptress
LXX. The Prime Minister's House
LXXI. Comparing Notes
LXXII. Madame Goesler's Generosity
LXXIII. Amantium Iræ
LXXIV. The Beginning of the End
LXXV. P. P. C.
LXXVI. Conclusion
VOLUME I
CHAPTER I
Phineas Finn Proposes to Stand for Loughshane
Dr. Finn, of Killaloe, in county Clare, was as well known in those
parts,--the confines, that is, of the counties Clare, Limerick,
Tipperary, and Galway,--as was the bishop himself who lived in the
same town, and was as much respected. Many said that the doctor was
the richer man of the two, and the practice of his profession was
extended over almost as wide a district. Indeed the bishop whom he
was privileged to attend, although a Roman Catholic, always spoke of
their dioceses being conterminate. It will therefore be understood
that Dr. Finn,--Malachi Finn was his full name,--had obtained a wide
reputation as a country practitioner in the west of Ireland. And he
was a man sufficiently well to do, though that boast made by his
friends, that he was as warm a man as the bishop, had but little
truth to support it. Bishops in Ireland, if they live at home, even
in these days, are very warm men; and Dr. Finn had not a penny in the
world for which he had not worked hard. He had, moreover, a costly
family, five daughters and one son, and, at the time of which we
are speaking, no provision in the way of marriage or profession had
been made for any of them. Of the one son, Phineas, the hero of the
following pages, the mother and five sisters were very proud. The
doctor was accustomed to say that his goose was as good as any other
man's goose, as far as he could see as yet; but that he should like
some very strong evidence before he allowed himself to express an
opinion that the young bird partook, in any degree, of the qualities
of a swan. From which it may be gathered that Dr. Finn was a man of
common-sense.
Phineas had come to be a swan in the estimation of his mother and
sisters by reason of certain early successes at college. His father,
whose religion was not of that bitter kind in which we in England
are apt to suppose that all the Irish Roman Catholics indulge, had
sent his son to Trinity; and there were some in the neighbourhood of
Killaloe,--patients, probably, of Dr. Duggin, of Castle Connell, a
learned physician who had spent a fruitless life in endeavouring to
make head against Dr. Finn,--who declared that old Finn would not be
sorry if his son were to turn Protestant and go in for a fellowship.
Mrs. Finn was a Protestant, and the five Miss Finns were Protestants,
and the doctor himself was very much given to dining out among his
Protestant friends on a Friday. Our Phineas, however, did not turn
Protestant up in Dublin, whatever his father's secret wishes on that
subject may have been. He did join a debating society, to success
in which his religion was no bar; and he there achieved a sort of
distinction which was both easy and pleasant, and which, making
its way down to Killaloe, assisted in engendering those ideas as
to swanhood of which maternal and sisterly minds are so sweetly
susceptible. "I know half a dozen old windbags at the present
moment," said the doctor, "who were great fellows at debating clubs
when they were boys." "Phineas is not a boy any longer," said Mrs.
Finn. "And windbags don't get college scholarships," said Matilda
Finn, the second daughter. "But papa always snubs Phinny," said
Barbara, the youngest. "I'll snub you, if you don't take care," said
the doctor, taking Barbara tenderly by the ear;--for his youngest
daughter was the doctor's pet.
The doctor certainly did not snub his son, for he allowed him to go
over to London when he was twenty-two years of age, in order that he
might read with an English barrister. It was the doctor's wish that
his son might be called to the Irish Bar, and the young man's desire
that he might go to the English Bar. The doctor so far gave way,
under the influence of Phineas himself, and of all the young women of
the family, as to pay the usual fee to a very competent and learned
gentleman in the Middle Temple, and to allow his son one hundred and
fifty pounds per annum for three years. Dr. Finn, however, was still
firm in his intention that his son should settle in Dublin, and take
the Munster Circuit,--believing that Phineas might come to want home
influences and home connections, in spite of the swanhood which was
attributed to him.
Phineas sat his terms for three years, and was duly called to
the Bar; but no evidence came home as to the acquirement of any
considerable amount of law lore, or even as to much law study, on
the part of the young aspirant. The learned pundit at whose feet he
had been sitting was not especially loud in praise of his pupil's
industry, though he did say a pleasant word or two as to his pupil's
intelligence. Phineas himself did not boast much of his own hard
work when at home during the long vacation. No rumours of expected
successes,--of expected professional successes,--reached the ears of
any of the Finn family at Killaloe. But, nevertheless, there came
tidings which maintained those high ideas in the maternal bosom of
which mention has been made, and which were of sufficient strength to
induce the doctor, in opposition to his own judgment, to consent to
the continued residence of his son in London. Phineas belonged to an
excellent club,--the Reform Club,--and went into very good society.
He was hand in glove with the Hon. Laurence Fitzgibbon, the youngest
son of Lord Claddagh. He was intimate with Barrington Erle, who had
been private secretary,--one of the private secretaries,--to the
great Whig Prime Minister who was lately in but was now out. He had
dined three or four times with that great Whig nobleman, the Earl of
Brentford. And he had been assured that if he stuck to the English
Bar he would certainly do well. Though he might fail to succeed in
court or in chambers, he would doubtless have given to him some
one of those numerous appointments for which none but clever young
barristers are supposed to be fitting candidates. The old doctor
yielded for another year, although at the end of the second year he
was called upon to pay a sum of three hundred pounds, which was then
due by Phineas to creditors in London. When the doctor's male friends
in and about Killaloe heard that he had done so, they said that he
was doting. Not one of the Miss Finns was as yet married; and, after
all that had been said about the doctor's wealth, it was supposed
that there would not be above five hundred pounds a year among them
all, were he to give up his profession. But the doctor, when he paid
that three hundred pounds for his son, buckled to his work again,
though he had for twelve months talked of giving up the midwifery.
He buckled to again, to the great disgust of Dr. Duggin, who at this
time said very ill-natured things about young Phineas.
At the end of the three years Phineas was called to the Bar, and
immediately received a letter from his father asking minutely as to
his professional intentions. His father recommended him to settle
in Dublin, and promised the one hundred and fifty pounds for three
more years, on condition that this advice was followed. He did not
absolutely say that the allowance would be stopped if the advice were
not followed, but that was plainly to be implied. That letter came
at the moment of a dissolution of Parliament. Lord de Terrier, the
Conservative Prime Minister, who had now been in office for the
almost unprecedentedly long period of fifteen months, had found that
he could not face continued majorities against him in the House of
Commons, and had dissolved the House. Rumour declared that he would
have much preferred to resign, and betake himself once again to the
easy glories of opposition; but his party had naturally been obdurate
with him, and he had resolved to appeal to the country. When Phineas
received his father's letter, it had just been suggested to him at
the Reform Club that he should stand for the Irish borough of
Loughshane.
This proposition had taken Phineas Finn so much by surprise that when
first made to him by Barrington Erle it took his breath away. What!
he stand for Parliament, twenty-four years old, with no vestige
of property belonging to him, without a penny in his purse, as
completely dependent on his father as he was when he first went to
school at eleven years of age! And for Loughshane, a little borough
in the county Galway, for which a brother of that fine old Irish
peer, the Earl of Tulla, had been sitting for the last twenty
years,--a fine, high-minded representative of the thorough-going
Orange Protestant feeling of Ireland! And the Earl of Tulla, to
whom almost all Loughshane belonged,--or at any rate the land about
Loughshane,--was one of his father's staunchest friends! Loughshane
is in county Galway, but the Earl of Tulla usually lived at his seat
in county Clare, not more than ten miles from Killaloe, and always
confided his gouty feet, and the weak nerves of the old countess, and
the stomachs of all his domestics, to the care of Dr. Finn. How was
it possible that Phineas should stand for Loughshane? From whence
was the money to come for such a contest? It was a beautiful dream,
a grand idea, lifting Phineas almost off the earth by its glory.
When the proposition was first made to him in the smoking-room at
the Reform Club by his friend Erle, he was aware that he blushed
like a girl, and that he was unable at the moment to express
himself plainly,--so great was his astonishment and so great his
gratification. But before ten minutes had passed by, while Barrington
Erle was still sitting over his shoulder on the club sofa, and before
the blushes had altogether vanished, he had seen the improbability of
the scheme, and had explained to his friend that the thing could not
be done. But to his increased astonishment, his friend made nothing
of the difficulties. Loughshane, according to Barrington Erle, was
so small a place, that the expense would be very little. There were
altogether no more than 307 registered electors. The inhabitants were
so far removed from the world, and were so ignorant of the world's
good things, that they knew nothing about bribery. The Hon. George
Morris, who had sat for the last twenty years, was very unpopular. He
had not been near the borough since the last election, he had hardly
done more than show himself in Parliament, and had neither given a
shilling in the town nor got a place under Government for a single
son of Loughshane. "And he has quarrelled with his brother," said
Barrington Erle. "The devil he has!" said Phineas. "I thought they
always swore by each other." "It's at each other they swear now,"
said Barrington; "George has asked the Earl for more money, and the
Earl has cut up rusty." Then the negotiator went on to explain that
the expenses of the election would be defrayed out of a certain fund
collected for such purposes, that Loughshane had been chosen as a
cheap place, and that Phineas Finn had been chosen as a safe and
promising young man. As for qualification, if any question were
raised, that should be made all right. An Irish candidate was wanted,
and a Roman Catholic. So much the Loughshaners would require on
their own account when instigated to dismiss from their service
that thorough-going Protestant, the Hon. George Morris. Then "the
party,"--by which Barrington Erle probably meant the great man in
whose service he himself had become a politician,--required that
the candidate should be a safe man, one who would support "the
party,"--not a cantankerous, red-hot semi-Fenian, running about to
meetings at the Rotunda, and such-like, with views of his own about
tenant-right and the Irish Church. "But I have views of my own," said
Phineas, blushing again. "Of course you have, my dear boy," said
Barrington, clapping him on the back. "I shouldn't come to you unless
you had views. But your views and ours are the same, and you're
just the lad for Galway. You mightn't have such an opening again
in your life, and of course you'll stand for Loughshane." Then the
conversation was over, the private secretary went away to arrange
some other little matter of the kind, and Phineas Finn was left alone
to consider the proposition that had been made to him.
To become a member of the British Parliament! In all those hot
contests at the two debating clubs to which he had belonged, this
had been the ambition which had moved him. For, after all, to what
purpose of their own had those empty debates ever tended? He and
three or four others who had called themselves Liberals had been
pitted against four or five who had called themselves Conservatives,
and night after night they had discussed some ponderous subject
without any idea that one would ever persuade another, or that their
talking would ever conduce to any action or to any result. But each
of these combatants had felt,--without daring to announce a hope on
the subject among themselves,--that the present arena was only a
trial-ground for some possible greater amphitheatre, for some future
debating club in which debates would lead to action, and in which
eloquence would have power, even though persuasion might be out of
the question.
Phineas certainly had never dared to speak, even to himself, of such
a hope. The labours of the Bar had to be encountered before the dawn
of such a hope could come to him. And he had gradually learned to
feel that his prospects at the Bar were not as yet very promising. As
regarded professional work he had been idle, and how then could he
have a hope?
And now this thing, which he regarded as being of all things in the
world the most honourable, had come to him all at once, and was
possibly within his reach! If he could believe Barrington Erle, he
had only to lift up his hand, and he might be in Parliament within
two months. And who was to be believed on such a subject if not
Barrington Erle? This was Erle's special business, and such a man
would not have come to him on such a subject had he not been in
earnest, and had he not himself believed in success. There was an
opening ready, an opening to this great glory,--if only it might be
possible for him to fill it!
What would his father say? His father would of course oppose the
plan. And if he opposed his father, his father would of course stop
his income. And such an income as it was! Could it be that a man
should sit in Parliament and live upon a hundred and fifty pounds
a year? Since that payment of his debts he had become again
embarrassed,--to a slight amount. He owed a tailor a trifle, and a
bootmaker a trifle,--and something to the man who sold gloves and
shirts; and yet he had done his best to keep out of debt with more
than Irish pertinacity, living very closely, breakfasting upon tea
and a roll, and dining frequently for a shilling at a luncheon-house
up a court near Lincoln's Inn. Where should he dine if the
Loughshaners elected him to Parliament? And then he painted to
himself a not untrue picture of the probable miseries of a man who
begins life too high up on the ladder,--who succeeds in mounting
before he has learned how to hold on when he is aloft. For our
Phineas Finn was a young man not without sense,--not entirely a
windbag. If he did this thing the probability was that he might
become utterly a castaway, and go entirely to the dogs before he was
thirty. He had heard of penniless men who had got into Parliament,
and to whom had come such a fate. He was able to name to himself a
man or two whose barks, carrying more sail than they could bear, had
gone to pieces among early breakers in this way. But then, would
it not be better to go to pieces early than never to carry any
sail at all? And there was, at any rate, the chance of success. He
was already a barrister, and there were so many things open to a
barrister with a seat in Parliament! And as he knew of men who had
been utterly ruined by such early mounting, so also did he know of
others whose fortunes had been made by happy audacity when they were
young. He almost thought that he could die happy if he had once taken
his seat in Parliament,--if he had received one letter with those
grand initials written after his name on the address. Young men in
battle are called upon to lead forlorn hopes. Three fall, perhaps,
to one who gets through; but the one who gets through will have
the Victoria Cross to carry for the rest of his life. This was his
forlorn hope; and as he had been invited to undertake the work, he
would not turn from the danger. On the following morning he again saw
Barrington Erle by appointment, and then wrote the following letter
to his father:--
Reform Club, Feb., 186--.
MY DEAR FATHER,
I am afraid that the purport of this letter will startle
you, but I hope that when you have finished it you will
think that I am right in my decision as to what I am going
to do. You are no doubt aware that the dissolution of
Parliament will take place at once, and that we shall be
in all the turmoil of a general election by the middle of
March. I have been invited to stand for Loughshane, and
have consented. The proposition has been made to me by my
friend Barrington Erle, Mr. Mildmay's private secretary,
and has been made on behalf of the Political Committee of
the Reform Club. I need hardly say that I should not have
thought of such a thing with a less thorough promise of
support than this gives me, nor should I think of it now
had I not been assured that none of the expense of the
election would fall upon me. Of course I could not have
asked you to pay for it.
But to such a proposition, so made, I have felt that it
would be cowardly to give a refusal. I cannot but regard
such a selection as a great honour. I own that I am fond
of politics, and have taken great delight in their study
--("Stupid young fool!" his father said to himself as he
read this)--and it has been my dream for years past to
have a seat in Parliament at some future time. ("Dream!
yes; I wonder whether he has ever dreamed what he is to
live upon.") The chance has now come to me much earlier
than I have looked for it, but I do not think that it
should on that account be thrown away. Looking to my
profession, I find that many things are open to a
barrister with a seat in Parliament, and that the House
need not interfere much with a man's practice. ("Not if
he has got to the top of his tree," said the doctor.)
My chief doubt arose from the fact of your old friendship
with Lord Tulla, whose brother has filled the seat for I
don't know how many years. But it seems that George Morris
must go; or, at least, that he must be opposed by a
Liberal candidate. If I do not stand, some one else will,
and I should think that Lord Tulla will be too much of a
man to make any personal quarrel on such a subject. If he
is to lose the borough, why should not I have it as well
as another?
I can fancy, my dear father, all that you will say as to
my imprudence, and I quite confess that I have not a word
to answer. I have told myself more than once, since last
night, that I shall probably ruin myself. ("I wonder
whether he has ever told himself that he will probably
ruin me also," said the doctor.) But I am prepared to ruin
myself in such a cause. I have no one dependent on me;
and, as long as I do nothing to disgrace my name, I may
dispose of myself as I please. If you decide on stopping
my allowance, I shall have no feeling of anger against
you. ("How very considerate!" said the doctor.) And in
that case I shall endeavour to support myself by my pen.
I have already done a little for the magazines.
Give my best love to my mother and sisters. If you will
receive me during the time of the election, I shall see
them soon. Perhaps it will be best for me to say that I
have positively decided on making the attempt; that is to
say, if the Club Committee is as good as its promise. I
have weighed the matter all round, and I regard the prize
as being so great, that I am prepared to run any risk to
obtain it. Indeed, to me, with my views about politics,
the running of such a risk is no more than a duty. I
cannot keep my hand from the work now that the work has
come in the way of my hand. I shall be most anxious to get
a line from you in answer to this.
Your most affectionate son,
PHINEAS FINN.
I question whether Dr. Finn, when he read this letter, did not feel
more of pride than of anger,--whether he was not rather gratified
than displeased, in spite of all that his common-sense told him on
the subject. His wife and daughters, when they heard the news, were
clearly on the side of the young man. Mrs. Finn immediately expressed
an opinion that Parliament would be the making of her son, and that
everybody would be sure to employ so distinguished a barrister. The
girls declared that Phineas ought, at any rate, to have his chance,
and almost asserted that it would be brutal in their father to stand
in their brother's way. It was in vain that the doctor tried to
explain that going into Parliament could not help a young barrister,
whatever it might do for one thoroughly established in his
profession; that Phineas, if successful at Loughshane, would at once
abandon all idea of earning any income,--that the proposition, coming
from so poor a man, was a monstrosity,--that such an opposition
to the Morris family, coming from a son of his, would be gross
ingratitude to Lord Tulla. Mrs. Finn and the girls talked him down,
and the doctor himself was almost carried away by something like
vanity in regard to his son's future position.
Nevertheless he wrote a letter strongly advising Phineas to abandon
the project. But he himself was aware that the letter which he wrote
was not one from which any success could be expected. He advised
his son, but did not command him. He made no threats as to stopping
his income. He did not tell Phineas, in so many words, that he was
proposing to make an ass of himself. He argued very prudently against
the plan, and Phineas, when he received his father's letter, of
course felt that it was tantamount to a paternal permission to
proceed with the matter. On the next day he got a letter from his
mother full of affection, full of pride,--not exactly telling him to
stand for Loughshane by all means, for Mrs. Finn was not the woman to
run openly counter to her husband in any advice given by her to their
son,--but giving him every encouragement which motherly affection and
motherly pride could bestow. "Of course you will come to us," she
said, "if you do make up your mind to be member for Loughshane. We
shall all of us be so delighted to have you!" Phineas, who had fallen
into a sea of doubt after writing to his father, and who had demanded
a week from Barrington Erle to consider the matter, was elated to
positive certainty by the joint effect of the two letters from home.
He understood it all. His mother and sisters were altogether in
favour of his audacity, and even his father was not disposed to
quarrel with him on the subject.
"I shall take you at your word," he said to Barrington Erle at the
club that evening.
"What word?" said Erle, who had too many irons in the fire to be
thinking always of Loughshane and Phineas Finn,--or who at any rate
did not choose to let his anxiety on the subject be seen.
"About Loughshane."
"All right, old fellow; we shall be sure to carry you through. The
Irish writs will be out on the third of March, and the sooner you're
there the better."
CHAPTER II
Phineas Finn Is Elected for Loughshane
One great difficulty about the borough vanished in a very wonderful
way at the first touch. Dr. Finn, who was a man stout at heart,
and by no means afraid of his great friends, drove himself over to
Castlemorris to tell his news to the Earl, as soon as he got a second
letter from his son declaring his intention of proceeding with the
business, let the results be what they might. Lord Tulla was a
passionate old man, and the doctor expected that there would be a
quarrel;--but he was prepared to face that. He was under no special
debt of gratitude to the lord, having given as much as he had taken
in the long intercourse which had existed between them;--and he
agreed with his son in thinking that if there was to be a Liberal
candidate at Loughshane, no consideration of old pill-boxes and
gallipots should deter his son Phineas from standing. Other
considerations might very probably deter him, but not that. The Earl
probably would be of a different opinion, and the doctor felt it to
be incumbent on him to break the news to Lord Tulla.
"The devil he is!" said the Earl, when the doctor had told his story.
"Then I'll tell you what, Finn, I'll support him."
"You support him, Lord Tulla!"
"Yes;--why shouldn't I support him? I suppose it's not so bad with me
in the country that my support will rob him of his chance! I'll tell
you one thing for certain, I won't support George Morris."
"But, my lord--"
"Well; go on."
"I've never taken much part in politics myself, as you know; but my
boy Phineas is on the other side."
"I don't care a ---- for sides. What has my party done for me?
Look at my cousin, Dick Morris. There's not a clergyman in Ireland
stauncher to them than he has been, and now they've given the deanery
of Kilfenora to a man that never had a father, though I condescended
to ask for it for my cousin. Let them wait till I ask for anything
again." Dr. Finn, who knew all about Dick Morris's debts, and who had
heard of his modes of preaching, was not surprised at the decision
of the Conservative bestower of Irish Church patronage; but on this
subject he said nothing. "And as for George," continued the Earl, "I
will never lift my hand again for him. His standing for Loughshane
would be quite out of the question. My own tenants wouldn't vote for
him if I were to ask them myself. Peter Blake"--Mr. Peter Blake was
the lord's agent--"told me only a week ago that it would be useless.
The whole thing is gone, and for my part I wish they'd disenfranchise
the borough. I wish they'd disenfranchise the whole country, and send
us a military governor. What's the use of such members as we send?
There isn't one gentleman among ten of them. Your son is welcome for
me. What support I can give him he shall have, but it isn't much. I
suppose he had better come and see me."
The doctor promised that his son should ride over to Castlemorris,
and then took his leave,--not specially flattered, as he felt that
were his son to be returned, the Earl would not regard him as the
one gentleman among ten whom the county might send to leaven the
remainder of its members,--but aware that the greatest impediment
in his son's way was already removed. He certainly had not gone to
Castlemorris with any idea of canvassing for his son, and yet he had
canvassed for him most satisfactorily. When he got home he did not
know how to speak of the matter otherwise than triumphantly to his
wife and daughters. Though he desired to curse, his mouth would speak
blessings. Before that evening was over the prospects of Phineas at
Loughshane were spoken of with open enthusiasm before the doctor,
and by the next day's post a letter was written to him by Matilda,
informing him that the Earl was prepared to receive him with open
arms. "Papa has been over there and managed it all," said Matilda.
"I'm told George Morris isn't going to stand," said Barrington Erle
to Phineas the night before his departure.
"His brother won't support him. His brother means to support me,"
said Phineas.
"That can hardly be so."
"But I tell you it is. My father has known the Earl these twenty
years, and has managed it."
"I say, Finn, you're not going to play us a trick, are you?" said Mr.
Erle, with something like dismay in his voice.
"What sort of trick?"
"You're not coming out on the other side?"
"Not if I know it," said Phineas, proudly. "Let me assure you I
wouldn't change my views in politics either for you or for the Earl,
though each of you carried seats in your breeches pockets. If I go
into Parliament, I shall go there as a sound Liberal,--not to support
a party, but to do the best I can for the country. I tell you so, and
I shall tell the Earl the same."
Barrington Erle turned away in disgust. Such language was to him
simply disgusting. It fell upon his ears as false maudlin sentiment
falls on the ears of the ordinary honest man of the world. Barrington
Erle was a man ordinarily honest. He would not have been untrue to
his mother's brother, William Mildmay, the great Whig Minister of the
day, for any earthly consideration. He was ready to work with wages
or without wages. He was really zealous in the cause, not asking
very much for himself. He had some undefined belief that it was much
better for the country that Mr. Mildmay should be in power than
that Lord de Terrier should be there. He was convinced that Liberal
politics were good for Englishmen, and that Liberal politics and the
Mildmay party were one and the same thing. It would be unfair to
Barrington Erle to deny to him some praise for patriotism. But he
hated the very name of independence in Parliament, and when he was
told of any man, that that man intended to look to measures and not
to men, he regarded that man as being both unstable as water and
dishonest as the wind. No good could possibly come from such a one,
and much evil might and probably would come. Such a politician was a
Greek to Barrington Erle, from whose hands he feared to accept even
the gift of a vote. Parliamentary hermits were distasteful to him,
and dwellers in political caves were regarded by him with aversion
as being either knavish or impractical. With a good Conservative
opponent he could shake hands almost as readily as with a good Whig
ally; but the man who was neither flesh nor fowl was odious to him.
According to his theory of parliamentary government, the House of
Commons should be divided by a marked line, and every member should
be required to stand on one side of it or on the other. "If not
with me, at any rate be against me," he would have said to every
representative of the people in the name of the great leader whom he
followed. He thought that debates were good, because of the people
outside,--because they served to create that public opinion which was
hereafter to be used in creating some future House of Commons; but he
did not think it possible that any vote should be given on a great
question, either this way or that, as the result of a debate; and he
was certainly assured in his own opinion that any such changing of
votes would be dangerous, revolutionary, and almost unparliamentary.
A member's vote,--except on some small crotchety open question thrown
out for the amusement of crotchety members,--was due to the leader of
that member's party. Such was Mr. Erle's idea of the English system
of Parliament, and, lending semi-official assistance as he did
frequently to the introduction of candidates into the House, he was
naturally anxious that his candidates should be candidates after his
own heart. When, therefore, Phineas Finn talked of measures and not
men, Barrington Erle turned away in open disgust. But he remembered
the youth and extreme rawness of the lad, and he remembered also the
careers of other men.
Barrington Erle was forty, and experience had taught him something.
After a few seconds, he brought himself to think mildly of the young
man's vanity,--as of the vanity of a plunging colt who resents the
liberty even of a touch. "By the end of the first session the thong
will be cracked over his head, as he patiently assists in pulling the
coach up hill, without producing from him even a flick of his tail,"
said Barrington Erle to an old parliamentary friend.
"If he were to come out after all on the wrong side," said the
parliamentary friend.
Erle admitted that such a trick as that would be unpleasant, but
he thought that old Lord Tulla was hardly equal to so clever a
stratagem.
Phineas went to Ireland, and walked over the course at Loughshane.
He called upon Lord Tulla, and heard that venerable nobleman talk a
great deal of nonsense. To tell the truth of Phineas, I must confess
that he wished to talk the nonsense himself; but the Earl would not
hear him, and put him down very quickly. "We won't discuss politics,
if you please, Mr. Finn; because, as I have already said, I am
throwing aside all political considerations." Phineas, therefore, was
not allowed to express his views on the government of the country in
the Earl's sitting-room at Castlemorris. There was, however, a good
time coming; and so, for the present, he allowed the Earl to ramble
on about the sins of his brother George, and the want of all proper
pedigree on the part of the new Dean of Kilfenora. The conference
ended with an assurance on the part of Lord Tulla that if the
Loughshaners chose to elect Mr. Phineas Finn he would not be in the
least offended. The electors did elect Mr. Phineas Finn,--perhaps
for the reason given by one of the Dublin Conservative papers, which
declared that it was all the fault of the Carlton Club in not sending
a proper candidate. There was a great deal said about the matter,
both in London and Dublin, and the blame was supposed to fall on
the joint shoulders of George Morris and his elder brother. In the
meantime, our hero, Phineas Finn, had been duly elected member of
Parliament for the borough of Loughshane.
The Finn family could not restrain their triumphings at Killaloe, and
I do not know that it would have been natural had they done so. A
gosling from such a flock does become something of a real swan by
getting into Parliament. The doctor had his misgivings,--had great
misgivings, fearful forebodings; but there was the young man elected,
and he could not help it. He could not refuse his right hand to his
son or withdraw his paternal assistance because that son had been
specially honoured among the young men of his country. So he pulled
out of his hoard what sufficed to pay off outstanding debts,--they
were not heavy,--and undertook to allow Phineas two hundred and fifty
pounds a year as long as the session should last.
There was a widow lady living at Killaloe who was named Mrs. Flood
Jones, and she had a daughter. She had a son also, born to inherit
the property of the late Floscabel Flood Jones of Floodborough, as
soon as that property should have disembarrassed itself; but with
him, now serving with his regiment in India, we shall have no
concern. Mrs. Flood Jones was living modestly at Killaloe on her
widow's jointure,--Floodborough having, to tell the truth, pretty
nearly fallen into absolute ruin,--and with her one daughter, Mary.
Now on the evening before the return of Phineas Finn, Esq., M.P., to
London, Mrs. and Miss Flood Jones drank tea at the doctor's house.
"It won't make a bit of change in him," Barbara Finn said to her
friend Mary, up in some bedroom privacy before the tea-drinking
ceremonies had altogether commenced.
"Oh, it must," said Mary.
"I tell you it won't, my dear; he is so good and so true."
"I know he is good, Barbara; and as for truth, there is no question
about it, because he has never said a word to me that he might not
say to any girl."
"That's nonsense, Mary."
"He never has, then, as sure as the blessed Virgin watches over
us;--only you don't believe she does."
"Never mind about the Virgin now, Mary."
"But he never has. Your brother is nothing to me, Barbara."
"Then I hope he will be before the evening is over. He was walking
with you all yesterday and the day before."
"Why shouldn't he,--and we that have known each other all our lives?
But, Barbara, pray, pray never say a word of this to any one!"
"Is it I? Wouldn't I cut out my tongue first?"
"I don't know why I let you talk to me in this way. There has never
been anything between me and Phineas,--your brother I mean."
"I know whom you mean very well."
"And I feel quite sure that there never will be. Why should there?
He'll go out among great people and be a great man; and I've already
found out that there's a certain Lady Laura Standish whom he admires
very much."
"Lady Laura Fiddlestick!"
"A man in Parliament, you know, may look up to anybody," said Miss
Mary Flood Jones.
"I want Phin to look up to you, my dear."
"That wouldn't be looking up. Placed as he is now, that would be
looking down; and he is so proud that he'll never do that. But come
down, dear, else they'll wonder where we are."
Mary Flood Jones was a little girl about twenty years of age, with
the softest hair in the world, of a colour varying between brown and
auburn,--for sometimes you would swear it was the one and sometimes
the other; and she was as pretty as ever she could be. She was one
of those girls, so common in Ireland, whom men, with tastes that way
given, feel inclined to take up and devour on the spur of the moment;
and when she liked her lion, she had a look about her which seemed to
ask to be devoured. There are girls so cold-looking,--pretty girls,
too, ladylike, discreet, and armed with all accomplishments,--whom to
attack seems to require the same sort of courage, and the same sort
of preparation, as a journey in quest of the north-west passage. One
thinks of a pedestal near the Athenaeum as the most appropriate and
most honourable reward of such courage. But, again, there are other
girls to abstain from attacking whom is, to a man of any warmth
of temperament, quite impossible. They are like water when one is
athirst, like plovers' eggs in March, like cigars when one is out
in the autumn. No one ever dreams of denying himself when such
temptation comes in the way. It often happens, however, that in spite
of appearances, the water will not come from the well, nor the egg
from its shell, nor will the cigar allow itself to be lit. A girl of
such appearance, so charming, was Mary Flood Jones of Killaloe, and
our hero Phineas was not allowed to thirst in vain for a drop from
the cool spring.
When the girls went down into the drawing-room Mary was careful to
go to a part of the room quite remote from Phineas, so as to seat
herself between Mrs. Finn and Dr. Finn's young partner, Mr. Elias
Bodkin, from Ballinasloe. But Mrs. Finn and the Miss Finns and all
Killaloe knew that Mary had no love for Mr. Bodkin, and when Mr.
Bodkin handed her the hot cake she hardly so much as smiled at him.
But in two minutes Phineas was behind her chair, and then she smiled;
and in five minutes more she had got herself so twisted round that
she was sitting in a corner with Phineas and his sister Barbara; and
in two more minutes Barbara had returned to Mr. Elias Bodkin, so that
Phineas and Mary were uninterrupted. They manage these things very
quickly and very cleverly in Killaloe.
"I shall be off to-morrow morning by the early train," said Phineas.
"So soon;--and when will you have to begin,--in Parliament, I mean?"
"I shall have to take my seat on Friday. I'm going back just in
time."
"But when shall we hear of your saying something?"
"Never, probably. Not one in ten who go into Parliament ever do say
anything."
"But you will; won't you? I hope you will. I do so hope you will
distinguish yourself;--because of your sister, and for the sake of
the town, you know."
"And is that all, Mary?"
"Isn't that enough?"
"You don't care a bit about myself, then?"
"You know that I do. Haven't we been friends ever since we were
children? Of course it will be a great pride to me that a person whom
I have known so intimately should come to be talked about as a great
man."
"I shall never be talked about as a great man."
"You're a great man to me already, being in Parliament. Only
think;--I never saw a member of Parliament in my life before."
"You've seen the bishop scores of times."
"Is he in Parliament? Ah, but not like you. He couldn't come to be
a Cabinet Minister, and one never reads anything about him in the
newspapers. I shall expect to see your name, very often, and I shall
always look for it. 'Mr. Phineas Finn paired off with Mr. Mildmay.'
What is the meaning of pairing off?"
"I'll explain it all to you when I come back, after learning my
lesson."
"Mind you do come back. But I don't suppose you ever will. You will
be going somewhere to see Lady Laura Standish when you are not wanted
in Parliament."
"Lady Laura Standish!"
"And why shouldn't you? Of course, with your prospects, you should
go as much as possible among people of that sort. Is Lady Laura very
pretty?"
"She's about six feet high."
"Nonsense. I don't believe that."
"She would look as though she were, standing by you."
"Because I am so insignificant and small."
"Because your figure is perfect, and because she is straggling. She
is as unlike you as possible in everything. She has thick lumpy red
hair, while yours is all silk and softness. She has large hands and
feet, and--"
"Why, Phineas, you are making her out to be an ogress, and yet I know
that you admire her."
"So I do, because she possesses such an appearance of power. And
after all, in spite of the lumpy hair, and in spite of large hands
and straggling figure, she is handsome. One can't tell what it is.
One can see that she is quite contented with herself, and intends to
make others contented with her. And so she does."
"I see you are in love with her, Phineas."
"No; not in love,--not with her at least. Of all men in the world, I
suppose that I am the last that has a right to be in love. I daresay
I shall marry some day."
"I'm sure I hope you will."
"But not till I'm forty or perhaps fifty years old. If I was not fool
enough to have what men call a high ambition I might venture to be in
love now."
"I'm sure I'm very glad that you've got a high ambition. It is what
every man ought to have; and I've no doubt that we shall hear of your
marriage soon,--very soon. And then,--if she can help you in your
ambition, we--shall--all--be so--glad."
Phineas did not say a word further then. Perhaps some commotion among
the party broke up the little private conversation in the corner. And
he was not alone with Mary again till there came a moment for him
to put her cloak over her shoulders in the back parlour, while Mrs.
Flood Jones was finishing some important narrative to his mother. It
was Barbara, I think, who stood in some doorway, and prevented people
from passing, and so gave him the opportunity which he abused.
"Mary," said he, taking her in his arms, without a single word of
love-making beyond what the reader has heard,--"one kiss before we
part."
"No, Phineas, no!" But the kiss had been taken and given before she
had even answered him. "Oh, Phineas, you shouldn't!"
"I should. Why shouldn't I? And, Mary, I will have one morsel of your
hair."
"You shall not; indeed you shall not!" But the scissors were at hand,
and the ringlet was cut and in his pocket before she was ready with
her resistance. There was nothing further;--not a word more, and Mary
went away with her veil down, under her mother's wing, weeping sweet
silent tears which no one saw.
"You do love her; don't you, Phineas?" asked Barbara.
"Bother! Do you go to bed, and don't trouble yourself about such
trifles. But mind you're up, old girl, to see me off in the morning."
Everybody was up to see him off in the morning, to give him coffee
and good advice, and kisses, and to throw all manner of old shoes
after him as he started on his great expedition to Parliament. His
father gave him an extra twenty-pound note, and begged him for God's
sake to be careful about his money. His mother told him always to
have an orange in his pocket when he intended to speak longer than
usual. And Barbara in a last whisper begged him never to forget dear
Mary Flood Jones.
CHAPTER III
Phineas Finn Takes His Seat
Phineas had many serious, almost solemn thoughts on his journey
towards London. I am sorry I must assure my female readers that very
few of them had reference to Mary Flood Jones. He had, however, very
carefully packed up the tress, and could bring that out for proper
acts of erotic worship at seasons in which his mind might be less
engaged with affairs of state than it was at present. Would he make a
failure of this great matter which he had taken in hand? He could not
but tell himself that the chances were twenty to one against him. Now
that he looked nearer at it all, the difficulties loomed larger than
ever, and the rewards seemed to be less, more difficult of approach,
and more evanescent. How many members were there who could never get
a hearing! How many who only spoke to fail! How many, who spoke well,
who could speak to no effect as far as their own worldly prospects
were concerned! He had already known many members of Parliament to
whom no outward respect or sign of honour was ever given by any one;
and it seemed to him, as he thought over it, that Irish members of
Parliament were generally treated with more indifference than any
others. There were O'B---- and O'C---- and O'D----, for whom no one
cared a straw, who could hardly get men to dine with them at the
club, and yet they were genuine members of Parliament. Why should he
ever be better than O'B----, or O'C----, or O'D----? And in what way
should he begin to be better? He had an idea of the fashion after
which it would be his duty to strive that he might excel those
gentlemen. He did not give any of them credit for much earnestness
in their country's behalf, and he was minded to be very earnest. He
would go to his work honestly and conscientiously, determined to do
his duty as best he might, let the results to himself be what they
would. This was a noble resolution, and might have been pleasant to
him,--had he not remembered that smile of derision which had come
over his friend Erle's face when he declared his intention of doing
his duty to his country as a Liberal, and not of supporting a party.
O'B---- and O'C---- and O'D---- were keen enough to support their
party, only they were sometimes a little astray at knowing which
was their party for the nonce. He knew that Erle and such men would
despise him if he did not fall into the regular groove,--and if the
Barrington Erles despised him, what would then be left for him?
His moody thoughts were somewhat dissipated when he found one
Laurence Fitzgibbon,--the Honourable Laurence Fitzgibbon,--a special
friend of his own, and a very clever fellow, on board the boat as it
steamed out of Kingston harbour. Laurence Fitzgibbon had also just
been over about his election, and had been returned as a matter of
course for his father's county. Laurence Fitzgibbon had sat in the
House for the last fifteen years, and was yet well-nigh as young a
man as any in it. And he was a man altogether different from the
O'B----s, O'C----s, and O'D----s. Laurence Fitzgibbon could always
get the ear of the House if he chose to speak, and his friends
declared that he might have been high up in office long since if he
would have taken the trouble to work. He was a welcome guest at the
houses of the very best people, and was a friend of whom any one
might be proud. It had for two years been a feather in the cap of
Phineas that he knew Laurence Fitzgibbon. And yet people said that
Laurence Fitzgibbon had nothing of his own, and men wondered how he
lived. He was the youngest son of Lord Claddagh, an Irish peer with a
large family, who could do nothing for Laurence, his favourite child,
beyond finding him a seat in Parliament.
"Well, Finn, my boy," said Laurence, shaking hands with the young
member on board the steamer, "so you've made it all right at
Loughshane." Then Phineas was beginning to tell all the story,
the wonderful story, of George Morris and the Earl of Tulla,--how
the men of Loughshane had elected him without opposition; how he
had been supported by Conservatives as well as Liberals;--how
unanimous Loughshane had been in electing him, Phineas Finn, as its
representative. But Mr. Fitzgibbon seemed to care very little about
all this, and went so far as to declare that those things were
accidents which fell out sometimes one way and sometimes another,
and were altogether independent of any merit or demerit on the part
of the candidate himself. And it was marvellous and almost painful
to Phineas that his friend Fitzgibbon should accept the fact of his
membership with so little of congratulation,--with absolutely no
blowing of trumpets whatever. Had he been elected a member of the
municipal corporation of Loughshane, instead of its representative in
the British Parliament, Laurence Fitzgibbon could not have made less
fuss about it. Phineas was disappointed, but he took the cue from his
friend too quickly to show his disappointment. And when, half an hour
after their meeting, Fitzgibbon had to be reminded that his companion
was not in the House during the last session, Phineas was able to
make the remark as though he thought as little about the House as did
the old-accustomed member himself.
"As far as I can see as yet," said Fitzgibbon, "we are sure to have
seventeen."
"Seventeen?" said Phineas, not quite understanding the meaning of the
number quoted.
"A majority of seventeen. There are four Irish counties and three
Scotch which haven't returned as yet; but we know pretty well what
they'll do. There's a doubt about Tipperary, of course, but whichever
gets in of the seven who are standing, it will be a vote on our side.
Now the Government can't live against that. The uphill strain is too
much for them."
"According to my idea, nothing can justify them in trying to live
against a majority."
"That's gammon. When the thing is so equal, anything is fair. But you
see they don't like it. Of course there are some among them as hungry
as we are; and Dubby would give his toes and fingers to remain in."
Dubby was the ordinary name by which, among friends and foes, Mr.
Daubeny was known: Mr. Daubeny, who at that time was the leader of
the Conservative party in the House of Commons. "But most of them,"
continued Mr. Fitzgibbon, "prefer the other game, and if you don't
care about money, upon my word it's the pleasanter game of the two."
"But the country gets nothing done by a Tory Government."
"As to that, it's six of one and half a dozen of the other. I never
knew a government yet that wanted to do anything. Give a government
a real strong majority, as the Tories used to have half a century
since, and as a matter of course it will do nothing. Why should
it? Doing things, as you call it, is only bidding for power,--for
patronage and pay."
"And is the country to have no service done?"
"The country gets quite as much service as it pays for,--and perhaps
a little more. The clerks in the offices work for the country. And
the Ministers work too, if they've got anything to manage. There is
plenty of work done;--but of work in Parliament, the less the better,
according to my ideas. It's very little that ever is done, and that
little is generally too much."
"But the people--"
"Come down and have a glass of brandy-and-water, and leave the people
alone for the present. The people can take care of themselves a great
deal better than we can take care of them." Mr. Fitzgibbon's doctrine
as to the commonwealth was very different from that of Barrington
Erle, and was still less to the taste of the new member. Barrington
Erle considered that his leader, Mr. Mildmay, should be intrusted to
make all necessary changes in the laws, and that an obedient House of
Commons should implicitly obey that leader in authorising all changes
proposed by him;--but according to Barrington Erle, such changes
should be numerous and of great importance, and would, if duly passed
into law at his lord's behest, gradually produce such a Whig Utopia
in England as has never yet been seen on the face of the earth.
Now, according to Mr. Fitzgibbon, the present Utopia would be good
enough,--if only he himself might be once more put into possession
of a certain semi-political place about the Court, from which he had
heretofore drawn £1,000 per annum, without any work, much to his
comfort. He made no secret of his ambition, and was chagrined simply
at the prospect of having to return to his electors before he could
enjoy those good things which he expected to receive from the
undoubted majority of seventeen, which had been, or would be,
achieved.
"I hate all change as a rule," said Fitzgibbon; "but, upon my word,
we ought to alter that. When a fellow has got a crumb of comfort,
after waiting for it years and years, and perhaps spending thousands
in elections, he has to go back and try his hand again at the last
moment, merely in obedience to some antiquated prejudice. Look at
poor Jack Bond,--the best friend I ever had in the world. He was
wrecked upon that rock for ever. He spent every shilling he had in
contesting Romford three times running,--and three times running
he got in. Then they made him Vice-Comptroller of the Granaries,
and I'm shot if he didn't get spilt at Romford on standing for his
re-election!"
"And what became of him?"
"God knows. I think I heard that he married an old woman and settled
down somewhere. I know he never came up again. Now, I call that a
confounded shame. I suppose I'm safe down in Mayo, but there's no
knowing what may happen in these days."
As they parted at Euston Square, Phineas asked his friend some little
nervous question as to the best mode of making a first entrance into
the House. Would Laurence Fitzgibbon see him through the difficulties
of the oath-taking? But Laurence Fitzgibbon made very little of the
difficulty. "Oh;--you just come down, and there'll be a rush of
fellows, and you'll know everybody. You'll have to hang about for an
hour or so, and then you'll get pushed through. There isn't time for
much ceremony after a general election."
Phineas reached London early in the morning, and went home to bed
for an hour or so. The House was to meet on that very day, and he
intended to begin his parliamentary duties at once if he should find
it possible to get some one to accompany him; He felt that he should
lack courage to go down to Westminster Hall alone, and explain to
the policeman and door-keepers that he was the man who had just been
elected member for Loughshane. So about noon he went into the Reform
Club, and there he found a great crowd of men, among whom there was a
plentiful sprinkling of members. Erle saw him in a moment, and came
to him with congratulations.
"So you're all right, Finn," said he.
"Yes; I'm all right,--I didn't have much doubt about it when I went
over."
"I never heard of a fellow with such a run of luck," said Erle. "It's
just one of those flukes that occur once in a dozen elections. Any
one on earth might have got in without spending a shilling."
Phineas didn't at all like this. "I don't think any one could have
got in," said he, "without knowing Lord Tulla."
"Lord Tulla was nowhere, my dear boy, and could have nothing to say
to it. But never mind that. You meet me in the lobby at two. There'll
be a lot of us there, and we'll go in together. Have you seen
Fitzgibbon?" Then Barrington Erle went off to other business, and
Finn was congratulated by other men. But it seemed to him that the
congratulations of his friends were not hearty. He spoke to some men,
of whom he thought that he knew they would have given their eyes
to be in Parliament;--and yet they spoke of his success as being a
very ordinary thing. "Well, my boy, I hope you like it," said one
middle-aged gentleman whom he had known ever since he came up to
London. "The difference is between working for nothing and working
for money. You'll have to work for nothing now."
"That's about it, I suppose," said Phineas.
"They say the House is a comfortable club," said the middle-aged
friend, "but I confess that I shouldn't like being rung away from my
dinner myself."
At two punctually Phineas was in the lobby at Westminster, and then
he found himself taken into the House with a crowd of other men. The
old and young, and they who were neither old nor young, were mingled
together, and there seemed to be very little respect of persons. On
three or four occasions there was some cheering when a popular man or
a great leader came in; but the work of the day left but little clear
impression on the mind of the young member. He was confused, half
elated, half disappointed, and had not his wits about him. He found
himself constantly regretting that he was there; and as constantly
telling himself that he, hardly yet twenty-five, without a shilling
of his own, had achieved an entrance into that assembly which by the
consent of all men is the greatest in the world, and which many of
the rich magnates of the country had in vain spent heaps of treasure
in their endeavours to open to their own footsteps. He tried hard to
realise what he had gained, but the dust and the noise and the crowds
and the want of something august to the eye were almost too strong
for him. He managed, however, to take the oath early among those who
took it, and heard the Queen's speech read and the Address moved and
seconded. He was seated very uncomfortably, high up on a back seat,
between two men whom he did not know; and he found the speeches to be
very long. He had been in the habit of seeing such speeches reported
in about a column, and he thought that these speeches must take at
least four columns each. He sat out the debate on the Address till
the House was adjourned, and then he went away to dine at his club.
He did go into the dining-room of the House, but there was a crowd
there, and he found himself alone,--and to tell the truth, he was
afraid to order his dinner.
The nearest approach to a triumph which he had in London came to him
from the glory which his election reflected upon his landlady. She
was a kindly good motherly soul, whose husband was a journeyman
law-stationer, and who kept a very decent house in Great Marlborough
Street. Here Phineas had lodged since he had been in London, and was
a great favourite. "God bless my soul, Mr. Phineas," said she, "only
think of your being a member of Parliament!"
"Yes, I'm a member of Parliament, Mrs. Bunce."
"And you'll go on with the rooms the same as ever? Well, I never
thought to have a member of Parliament in 'em."
Mrs. Bunce really had realised the magnitude of the step which her
lodger had taken, and Phineas was grateful to her.
CHAPTER IV
Lady Laura Standish
Phineas, in describing Lady Laura Standish to Mary Flood Jones at
Killaloe, had not painted her in very glowing colours. Nevertheless
he admired Lady Laura very much, and she was worthy of admiration. It
was probably the greatest pride of our hero's life that Lady Laura
Standish was his friend, and that she had instigated him to undertake
the risk of parliamentary life. Lady Laura was intimate also with
Barrington Erle, who was, in some distant degree, her cousin;
and Phineas was not without a suspicion that his selection for
Loughshane, from out of all the young liberal candidates, may have
been in some degree owing to Lady Laura's influence with Barrington
Erle. He was not unwilling that it should be so; for though,
as he had repeatedly told himself, he was by no means in love
with Lady Laura,--who was, as he imagined, somewhat older than
himself,--nevertheless, he would feel gratified at accepting anything
from her hands, and he felt a keen desire for some increase to those
ties of friendship which bound them together. No;--he was not in love
with Lady Laura Standish. He had not the remotest idea of asking her
to be his wife. So he told himself, both before he went over for his
election, and after his return. When he had found himself in a corner
with poor little Mary Flood Jones, he had kissed her as a matter of
course; but he did not think that he could, in any circumstances, be
tempted to kiss Lady Laura. He supposed that he was in love with his
darling little Mary,--after a fashion. Of course, it could never come
to anything, because of the circumstances of his life, which were
so imperious to him. He was not in love with Lady Laura, and yet he
hoped that his intimacy with her might come to much. He had more than
once asked himself how he would feel when somebody else came to be
really in love with Lady Laura,--for she was by no means a woman to
lack lovers,--when some one else should be in love with her, and be
received by her as a lover; but this question he had never been able
to answer. There were many questions about himself which he usually
answered by telling himself that it was his fate to walk over
volcanoes. "Of course, I shall be blown into atoms some fine day," he
would say; "but after all, that is better than being slowly boiled
down into pulp."
The House had met on a Friday, again on the Saturday morning, and
the debate on the Address had been adjourned till the Monday. On
the Sunday, Phineas determined that he would see Lady Laura. She
professed to be always at home on Sunday, and from three to four in
the afternoon her drawing-room would probably be half full of people.
There would, at any rate, be comers and goers, who would prevent
anything like real conversation between himself and her. But for a
few minutes before that he might probably find her alone, and he was
most anxious to see whether her reception of him, as a member of
Parliament, would be in any degree warmer than that of his other
friends. Hitherto he had found no such warmth since he came to
London, excepting that which had glowed in the bosom of Mrs. Bunce.
Lady Laura Standish was the daughter of the Earl of Brentford, and
was the only remaining lady of the Earl's family. The Countess had
been long dead; and Lady Emily, the younger daughter, who had been
the great beauty of her day, was now the wife of a Russian nobleman
whom she had persisted in preferring to any of her English suitors,
and lived at St. Petersburg. There was an aunt, old Lady Laura, who
came up to town about the middle of May; but she was always in the
country except for some six weeks in the season. There was a certain
Lord Chiltern, the Earl's son and heir, who did indeed live at the
family town house in Portman Square; but Lord Chiltern was a man of
whom Lady Laura's set did not often speak, and Phineas, frequently
as he had been at the house, had never seen Lord Chiltern there. He
was a young nobleman of whom various accounts were given by various
people; but I fear that the account most readily accepted in London
attributed to him a great intimacy with the affairs at Newmarket,
and a partiality for convivial pleasures. Respecting Lord Chiltern
Phineas had never as yet exchanged a word with Lady Laura. With her
father he was acquainted, as he had dined perhaps half a dozen times
at the house. The point in Lord Brentford's character which had more
than any other struck our hero, was the unlimited confidence which he
seemed to place in his daughter. Lady Laura seemed to have perfect
power of doing what she pleased. She was much more mistress of
herself than if she had been the wife instead of the daughter of the
Earl of Brentford,--and she seemed to be quite as much mistress of
the house.
Phineas had declared at Killaloe that Lady Laura was six feet high,
that she had red hair, that her figure was straggling, and that her
hands and feet were large. She was in fact about five feet seven
in height, and she carried her height well. There was something of
nobility in her gait, and she seemed thus to be taller than her
inches. Her hair was in truth red,--of a deep thorough redness. Her
brother's hair was the same; and so had been that of her father,
before it had become sandy with age. Her sister's had been of a soft
auburn hue, and hers had been said to be the prettiest head of hair
in Europe at the time of her marriage. But in these days we have got
to like red hair, and Lady Laura's was not supposed to stand in the
way of her being considered a beauty. Her face was very fair, though
it lacked that softness which we all love in women. Her eyes, which
were large and bright, and very clear, never seemed to quail, never
rose and sunk or showed themselves to be afraid of their own power.
Indeed, Lady Laura Standish had nothing of fear about her. Her
nose was perfectly cut, but was rather large, having the slightest
possible tendency to be aquiline. Her mouth also was large, but was
full of expression, and her teeth were perfect. Her complexion was
very bright, but in spite of its brightness she never blushed. The
shades of her complexion were set and steady. Those who knew her said
that her heart was so fully under command that nothing could stir her
blood to any sudden motion. As to that accusation of straggling which
had been made against her, it had sprung from ill-natured observation
of her modes of sitting. She never straggled when she stood or
walked; but she would lean forward when sitting, as a man does, and
would use her arms in talking, and would put her hand over her face,
and pass her fingers through her hair,--after the fashion of men
rather than of women;--and she seemed to despise that soft quiescence
of her sex in which are generally found so many charms. Her hands
and feet were large,--as was her whole frame. Such was Lady Laura
Standish; and Phineas Finn had been untrue to himself and to his own
appreciation of the lady when he had described her in disparaging
terms to Mary Flood Jones. But, though he had spoken of Lady Laura
in disparaging terms, he had so spoken of her as to make Miss Flood
Jones quite understand that he thought a great deal about Lady Laura.
And now, early on the Sunday, he made his way to Portman Square in
order that he might learn whether there might be any sympathy for him
there. Hitherto he had found none. Everything had been terribly dry
and hard, and he had gathered as yet none of the fruit which he had
expected that his good fortune would bear for him. It is true that he
had not as yet gone among any friends, except those of his club, and
men who were in the House along with him;--and at the club it might
be that there were some who envied him his good fortune, and others
who thought nothing of it because it had been theirs for years. Now
he would try a friend who, he hoped, could sympathise; and therefore
he called in Portman Square at about half-past two on the Sunday
morning. Yes,--Lady Laura was in the drawing-room. The hall-porter
admitted as much, but evidently seemed to think that he had been
disturbed from his dinner before his time. Phineas did not care a
straw for the hall-porter. If Lady Laura were not kind to him, he
would never trouble that hall-porter again. He was especially sore at
this moment because a valued friend, the barrister with whom he had
been reading for the last three years, had spent the best part of
an hour that Sunday morning in proving to him that he had as good
as ruined himself. "When I first heard it, of course I thought you
had inherited a fortune," said Mr. Low. "I have inherited nothing,"
Phineas replied;--"not a penny; and I never shall." Then Mr. Low had
opened his eyes very wide, and shaken his head very sadly, and had
whistled.
"I am so glad you have come, Mr. Finn," said Lady Laura, meeting
Phineas half-way across the large room.
"Thanks," said he, as he took her hand.
"I thought that perhaps you would manage to see me before any one
else was here."
"Well;--to tell the truth, I have wished it; though I can hardly tell
why."
"I can tell you why, Mr. Finn. But never mind;--come and sit down.
I am so very glad that you have been successful;--so very glad. You
know I told you that I should never think much of you if you did not
at least try it."
"And therefore I did try."
"And have succeeded. Faint heart, you know, never did any good. I
think it is a man's duty to make his way into the House;--that is, if
he ever means to be anybody. Of course it is not every man who can
get there by the time that he is five-and-twenty."
"Every friend that I have in the world says that I have ruined
myself."
"No;--I don't say so," said Lady Laura.
"And you are worth all the others put together. It is such a comfort
to have some one to say a cheery word to one."
"You shall hear nothing but cheery words here. Papa shall say cheery
words to you that shall be better than mine, because they shall be
weighted with the wisdom of age. I have heard him say twenty times
that the earlier a man goes into the House the better. There is much
to learn."
"But your father was thinking of men of fortune."
"Not at all;--of younger brothers, and barristers, and of men who
have their way to make, as you have. Let me see,--can you dine here
on Wednesday? There will be no party, of course, but papa will want
to shake hands with you; and you legislators of the Lower House are
more easily reached on Wednesdays than on any other day."
"I shall be delighted," said Phineas, feeling, however, that he did
not expect much sympathy from Lord Brentford.
"Mr. Kennedy dines here;--you know Mr. Kennedy, of Loughlinter; and
we will ask your friend Mr. Fitzgibbon. There will be nobody else. As
for catching Barrington Erle, that is out of the question at such a
time as this."
"But going back to my being ruined--" said Phineas, after a pause.
"Don't think of anything so disagreeable."
"You must not suppose that I am afraid of it. I was going to say that
there are worse things than ruin,--or, at any rate, than the chance
of ruin. Supposing that I have to emigrate and skin sheep, what
does it matter? I myself, being unencumbered, have myself as my own
property to do what I like with. With Nelson it was Westminster Abbey
or a peerage. With me it is parliamentary success or sheep-skinning."
"There shall be no sheep-skinning, Mr. Finn. I will guarantee you."
"Then I shall be safe."
At that moment the door of the room was opened, and a man entered
with quick steps, came a few yards in, and then retreated, slamming
the door after him. He was a man with thick short red hair, and an
abundance of very red beard. And his face was red,--and, as it seemed
to Phineas, his very eyes. There was something in the countenance of
the man which struck him almost with dread,--something approaching to
ferocity.
There was a pause a moment after the door was closed, and then Lady
Laura spoke. "It was my brother Chiltern. I do not think that you
have ever met him."
CHAPTER V
Mr. and Mrs. Low
That terrible apparition of the red Lord Chiltern had disturbed
Phineas in the moment of his happiness as he sat listening to the
kind flatteries of Lady Laura; and though Lord Chiltern had vanished
as quickly as he had appeared, there had come no return of his joy.
Lady Laura had said some word about her brother, and Phineas had
replied that he had never chanced to see Lord Chiltern. Then there
had been an awkward silence, and almost immediately other persons had
come in. After greeting one or two old acquaintances, among whom an
elder sister of Laurence Fitzgibbon was one, he took his leave and
escaped out into the square. "Miss Fitzgibbon is going to dine with
us on Wednesday," said Lady Laura. "She says she won't answer for her
brother, but she will bring him if she can."
"And you're a member of Parliament now too, they tell me," said Miss
Fitzgibbon, holding up her hands. "I think everybody will be in
Parliament before long. I wish I knew some man who wasn't, that I
might think of changing my condition."
But Phineas cared very little what Miss Fitzgibbon said to him.
Everybody knew Aspasia Fitzgibbon, and all who knew her were
accustomed to put up with the violence of her jokes and the
bitterness of her remarks. She was an old maid, over forty, very
plain, who, having reconciled herself to the fact that she was an old
maid, chose to take advantage of such poor privileges as the position
gave her. Within the last few years a considerable fortune had fallen
into her hands, some twenty-five thousand pounds, which had come to
her unexpectedly,--a wonderful windfall. And now she was the only one
of her family who had money at command. She lived in a small house by
herself, in one of the smallest streets of May Fair, and walked about
sturdily by herself, and spoke her mind about everything. She was
greatly devoted to her brother Laurence,--so devoted that there was
nothing she would not do for him, short of lending him money.
But Phineas when he found himself out in the square thought nothing
of Aspasia Fitzgibbon. He had gone to Lady Laura Standish for
sympathy, and she had given it to him in full measure. She understood
him and his aspirations if no one else did so on the face of the
earth. She rejoiced in his triumph, and was not too hard to tell him
that she looked forward to his success. And in what delightful
language she had done so! "Faint heart never won fair lady." It was
thus, or almost thus, that she had encouraged him. He knew well that
she had in truth meant nothing more than her words had seemed to
signify. He did not for a moment attribute to her aught else. But
might not he get another lesson from them? He had often told himself
that he was not in love with Laura Standish;--but why should he not
how tell himself that he was in love with her? Of course there would
be difficulty. But was it not the business of his life to overcome
difficulties? Had he not already overcome one difficulty almost as
great; and why should he be afraid of this other? Faint heart never
won fair lady! And this fair lady,--for at this moment he was ready
to swear that she was very fair,--was already half won. She could not
have taken him by the hand so warmly, and looked into his face so
keenly, had she not felt for him something stronger than common
friendship.
He had turned down Baker Street from the square, and was now walking
towards the Regent's Park. He would go and see the beasts in the
Zoological Gardens, and make up his mind as to his future mode of
life in that delightful Sunday solitude. There was very much as to
which it was necessary that he should make up his mind. If he
resolved that he would ask Lady Laura Standish to be his wife, when
should he ask her, and in what manner might he propose to her that
they should live? It would hardly suit him to postpone his courtship
indefinitely, knowing, as he did know, that he would be one among
many suitors. He could not expect her to wait for him if he did not
declare himself. And yet he could hardly ask her to come and share
with him the allowance made to him by his father! Whether she had
much fortune of her own, or little, or none at all, he did not in the
least know. He did know that the Earl had been distressed by his
son's extravagance, and that there had been some money difficulties
arising from this source.
But his great desire would be to support his own wife by his own
labour. At present he was hardly in a fair way to do that, unless he
could get paid for his parliamentary work. Those fortunate gentlemen
who form "The Government" are so paid. Yes;--there was the Treasury
Bench open to him, and he must resolve that he would seat himself
there. He would make Lady Laura understand this, and then he would
ask his question. It was true that at present his political opponents
had possession of the Treasury Bench;--but all governments are
mortal, and Conservative governments in this country are especially
prone to die. It was true that he could not hold even a Treasury
lordship with a poor thousand a year for his salary without having to
face the electors of Loughshane again before he entered upon the
enjoyment of his place;--but if he could only do something to give a
grace to his name, to show that he was a rising man, the electors of
Loughshane, who had once been so easy with him, would surely not be
cruel to him when he showed himself a second time among them. Lord
Tulla was his friend, and he had those points of law in his favour
which possession bestows. And then he remembered that Lady Laura was
related to almost everybody who was anybody among the high Whigs. She
was, he knew, second cousin to Mr. Mildmay, who for years had been
the leader of the Whigs, and was third cousin to Barrington Erle. The
late President of the Council, the Duke of St. Bungay, and Lord
Brentford had married sisters, and the St. Bungay people, and the
Mildmay people, and the Brentford people had all some sort of
connection with the Palliser people, of whom the heir and coming
chief, Plantagenet Palliser, would certainly be Chancellor of the
Exchequer in the next Government. Simply as an introduction into
official life nothing could be more conducive to chances of success
than a matrimonial alliance with Lady Laura. Not that he would have
thought of such a thing on that account! No;--he thought of it
because he loved her; honestly because he loved her. He swore to that
half a dozen times, for his own satisfaction. But, loving her as he
did, and resolving that in spite of all difficulties she should
become his wife, there could be no reason why he should not,--on her
account as well as on his own,--take advantage of any circumstances
that there might be in his favour.
As he wandered among the unsavoury beasts, elbowed on every side by
the Sunday visitors to the garden, he made up his mind that he would
first let Lady Laura understand what were his intentions with regard
to his future career, and then he would ask her to join her lot to
his. At every turn the chances would of course be very much against
him;--ten to one against him, perhaps, on every point; but it was his
lot in life to have to face such odds. Twelve months since it had
been much more than ten to one against his getting into Parliament;
and yet he was there. He expected to be blown into fragments,--to
sheep-skinning in Australia, or packing preserved meats on the plains
of Paraguay; but when the blowing into atoms should come, he was
resolved that courage to bear the ruin should not be wanting. Then he
quoted a line or two of a Latin poet, and felt himself to be
comfortable.
"So, here you are again, Mr. Finn," said a voice in his ear.
"Yes, Miss Fitzgibbon; here I am again."
"I fancied you members of Parliament had something else to do besides
looking at wild beasts. I thought you always spent Sunday in
arranging how you might most effectually badger each other on
Monday."
"We got through all that early this morning, Miss Fitzgibbon, while
you were saying your prayers."
"Here is Mr. Kennedy too;--you know him I daresay. He also is a
member; but then he can afford to be idle." But it so happened that
Phineas did not know Mr. Kennedy, and consequently there was some
slight form of introduction.
"I believe I am to meet you at dinner on Wednesday,"--said
Phineas,--"at Lord Brentford's."
"And me too," said Miss Fitzgibbon.
"Which will be the greatest possible addition to our pleasure," said
Phineas.
Mr. Kennedy, who seemed to be afflicted with some difficulty in
speaking, and whose bow to our hero had hardly done more than produce
the slightest possible motion to the top of his hat, hereupon
muttered something which was taken to mean an assent to the
proposition as to Wednesday's dinner. Then he stood perfectly still,
with his two hands fixed on the top of his umbrella, and gazed at the
great monkeys' cage. But it was clear that he was not looking at any
special monkey, for his eyes never wandered.
"Did you ever see such a contrast in your life?" said Miss Fitzgibbon
to Phineas,--hardly in a whisper.
"Between what?" said Phineas.
"Between Mr. Kennedy and a monkey. The monkey has so much to say for
himself, and is so delightfully wicked! I don't suppose that Mr.
Kennedy ever did anything wrong in his life."
Mr. Kennedy was a man who had very little temptation to do anything
wrong. He was possessed of over a million and a half of money, which
he was mistaken enough to suppose he had made himself; whereas it may
be doubted whether he had ever earned a penny. His father and his
uncle had created a business in Glasgow, and that business now
belonged to him. But his father and his uncle, who had toiled through
their long lives, had left behind them servants who understood the
work, and the business now went on prospering almost by its own
momentum. The Mr. Kennedy of the present day, the sole owner of the
business, though he did occasionally go to Glasgow, certainly did
nothing towards maintaining it. He had a magnificent place in
Perthshire, called Loughlinter, and he sat for a Scotch group of
boroughs, and he had a house in London, and a stud of horses in
Leicestershire, which he rarely visited, and was unmarried. He never
spoke much to any one, although he was constantly in society. He
rarely did anything, although he had the means of doing everything.
He had very seldom been on his legs in the House of Commons, though
he had sat there for ten years. He was seen about everywhere,
sometimes with one acquaintance and sometimes with another;--but it
may be doubted whether he had any friend. It may be doubted whether
he had ever talked enough to any man to make that man his friend.
Laurence Fitzgibbon tried him for one season, and after a month or
two asked for a loan of a few hundred pounds. "I never lend money to
any one under any circumstances," said Mr. Kennedy, and it was the
longest speech which had ever fallen from his mouth in the hearing of
Laurence Fitzgibbon. But though he would not lend money, he gave a
great deal,--and he would give it for almost every object. "Mr.
Robert Kennedy, M.P., Loughlinter, £105," appeared on almost every
charitable list that was advertised. No one ever spoke to him as to
this expenditure, nor did he ever speak to any one. Circulars came to
him and the cheques were returned. The duty was a very easy one to
him, and he performed it willingly. Had any amount of inquiry been
necessary, it is possible that the labour would have been too much
for him. Such was Mr. Robert Kennedy, as to whom Phineas had heard
that he had during the last winter entertained Lord Brentford and
Lady Laura, with very many other people of note, at his place in
Perthshire.
"I very much prefer the monkey," said Phineas to Miss Fitzgibbon.
"I thought you would," said she. "Like to like, you know. You have
both of you the same aptitude for climbing. But the monkeys never
fall, they tell me."
Phineas, knowing that he could gain nothing by sparring with Miss
Fitzgibbon, raised his hat and took his leave. Going out of a narrow
gate he found himself again brought into contact with Mr. Kennedy.
"What a crowd there is here," he said, finding himself bound to say
something. Mr. Kennedy, who was behind him, answered him not a word.
Then Phineas made up his mind that Mr. Kennedy was insolent with the
insolence of riches, and that he would hate Mr. Kennedy.
He was engaged to dine on this Sunday with Mr. Low, the barrister,
with whom he had been reading for the last three years. Mr. Low had
taken a strong liking to Phineas, as had also Mrs. Low, and the tutor
had more than once told his pupil that success in his profession was
certainly open to him if he would only stick to his work. Mr. Low was
himself an ambitious man, looking forward to entering Parliament at
some future time, when the exigencies of his life of labour might
enable him to do so; but he was prudent, given to close calculation,
and resolved to make the ground sure beneath his feet in every step
that he took forward. When he first heard that Finn intended to stand
for Loughshane he was stricken with dismay, and strongly dissuaded
him. "The electors may probably reject him. That's his only chance
now," Mr. Low had said to his wife, when he found that Phineas was,
as he thought, foolhardy. But the electors of Loughshane had not
rejected Mr. Low's pupil, and Mr. Low was now called upon to advise
what Phineas should do in his present circumstances. There is nothing
to prevent the work of a Chancery barrister being done by a member of
Parliament. Indeed, the most successful barristers are members of
Parliament. But Phineas Finn was beginning at the wrong end, and Mr.
Low knew that no good would come of it.
"Only think of your being in Parliament, Mr. Finn," said Mrs. Low.
"It is wonderful, isn't it?" said Phineas.
"It took us so much by surprise!" said Mrs. Low. "As a rule one never
hears of a barrister going into Parliament till after he's forty."
"And I'm only twenty-five. I do feel that I've disgraced myself. I
do, indeed, Mrs. Low."
"No;--you've not disgraced yourself, Mr. Finn. The only question is,
whether it's prudent. I hope it will all turn out for the best, most
heartily." Mrs. Low was a very matter-of-fact lady, four or five
years older than her husband, who had had a little money of her own,
and was possessed of every virtue under the sun. Nevertheless she did
not quite like the idea of her husband's pupil having got into
Parliament. If her husband and Phineas Finn were dining anywhere
together, Phineas, who had come to them quite a boy, would walk out
of the room before her husband. This could hardly be right!
Nevertheless she helped Phineas to the nicest bit of fish she could
find, and had he been ill, would have nursed him with the greatest
care.
After dinner, when Mrs. Low had gone up-stairs, there came the great
discussion between the tutor and the pupil, for the sake of which
this little dinner had been given. When Phineas had last been with
Mr. Low,--on the occasion of his showing himself at his tutor's
chambers after his return from Ireland,--he had not made up his mind
so thoroughly on certain points as he had done since he had seen Lady
Laura. The discussion could hardly be of any avail now,--but it could
not be avoided.
"Well, Phineas, and what do you mean to do?" said Mr. Low. Everybody
who knew our hero, or nearly everybody, called him by his Christian
name. There are men who seem to be so treated by general consent in
all societies. Even Mrs. Low, who was very prosaic, and unlikely to
be familiar in her mode of address, had fallen into the way of doing
it before the election. But she had dropped it, when the Phineas whom
she used to know became a member of Parliament.
"That's the question;--isn't it?" said Phineas.
"Of course you'll stick to your work?"
"What;--to the Bar?"
"Yes;--to the Bar."
"I am not thinking of giving it up permanently."
"Giving it up," said Mr. Low, raising his hands in surprise. "If you
give it up, how do you intend to live? Men are not paid for being
members of Parliament."
"Not exactly. But, as I said before, I am not thinking of giving it
up,--permanently."
"You mustn't give it up at all,--not for a day; that is, if you ever
mean to do any good."
"There I think that perhaps you may be wrong, Low!"
"How can I be wrong? Did a period of idleness ever help a man in any
profession? And is it not acknowledged by all who know anything about
it, that continuous labour is more necessary in our profession than
in any other?"
"I do not mean to be idle."
"What is it you do mean, Phineas?"
"Why simply this. Here I am in Parliament. We must take that as a
fact."
"I don't doubt the fact."
"And if it be a misfortune, we must make the best of it. Even you
wouldn't advise me to apply for the Chiltern Hundreds at once."
"I would;--to-morrow. My dear fellow, though I do not like to give
you pain, if you come to me I can only tell you what I think. My
advice to you is to give it up to-morrow. Men would laugh at you for
a few weeks, but that is better than being ruined for life."
"I can't do that," said Phineas, sadly.
"Very well;--then let us go on," said Mr. Low. "If you won't give up
your seat, the next best thing will be to take care that it shall
interfere as little as possible with your work. I suppose you must
sit upon some Committees."
"My idea is this,--that I will give up one year to learning the
practices of the House."
"And do nothing?"
"Nothing but that. Why, the thing is a study in itself. As for
learning it in a year, that is out of the question. But I am
convinced that if a man intends to be a useful member of Parliament,
he should make a study of it."
"And how do you mean to live in the meantime?" Mr. Low, who was an
energetic man, had assumed almost an angry tone of voice. Phineas for
awhile sat silent;--not that he felt himself to be without words for
a reply, but that he was thinking in what fewest words he might best
convey his ideas. "You have a very modest allowance from your father,
on which you have never been able to keep yourself free from debt,"
continued Mr. Low.
"He has increased it."
"And will it satisfy you to live here, in what will turn out to be
parliamentary club idleness, on the savings of his industrious life?
I think you will find yourself unhappy if you do that. Phineas, my
dear fellow, as far as I have as yet been able to see the world, men
don't begin either very good or very bad. They have generally good
aspirations with infirm purposes;--or, as we may say, strong bodies
with weak legs to carry them. Then, because their legs are weak, they
drift into idleness and ruin. During all this drifting they are
wretched, and when they have thoroughly drifted they are still
wretched. The agony of their old disappointment still clings to them.
In nine cases out of ten it is some one small unfortunate event that
puts a man astray at first. He sees some woman and loses himself with
her;--or he is taken to a racecourse and unluckily wins money;--or
some devil in the shape of a friend lures him to tobacco and brandy.
Your temptation has come in the shape of this accursed seat in
Parliament." Mr. Low had never said a soft word in his life to any
woman but the wife of his bosom, had never seen a racehorse, always
confined himself to two glasses of port after dinner, and looked upon
smoking as the darkest of all the vices.
"You have made up your mind, then, that I mean to be idle?"
"I have made up my mind that your time will be wholly
unprofitable,--if you do as you say you intend to do."
"But you do not know my plan;--just listen to me." Then Mr. Low did
listen, and Phineas explained his plan,--saying, of course, nothing
of his love for Lady Laura, but giving Mr. Low to understand that he
intended to assist in turning out the existing Government and to
mount up to some seat,--a humble seat at first,--on the Treasury
bench, by the help of his exalted friends and by the use of his own
gifts of eloquence. Mr. Low heard him without a word. "Of course,"
said Phineas, "after the first year my time will not be fully
employed, unless I succeed. And if I fail totally,--for, of course, I
may fail altogether--"
"It is possible," said Mr. Low.
"If you are resolved to turn yourself against me, I must not say
another word," said Phineas, with anger.
"Turn myself against you! I would turn myself any way so that I might
save you from the sort of life which you are preparing for yourself.
I see nothing in it that can satisfy any manly heart. Even if you are
successful, what are you to become? You will be the creature of some
minister, not his colleague. You are to make your way up the ladder
by pretending to agree whenever agreement is demanded from you, and
by voting whether you agree or do not. And what is to be your reward?
Some few precarious hundreds a year, lasting just so long as a party
may remain in power and you can retain a seat in Parliament! It is at
the best slavery and degradation,--even if you are lucky enough to
achieve the slavery."
"You yourself hope to go into Parliament and join a ministry some
day," said Phineas.
Mr. Low was not quick to answer, but he did answer at last. "That is
true, though I have never told you so. Indeed, it is hardly true to
say that I hope it. I have my dreams, and sometimes dare to tell
myself that they may possibly become waking facts. But if ever I sit
on a Treasury bench I shall sit there by special invitation, having
been summoned to take a high place because of my professional
success. It is but a dream after all, and I would not have you repeat
what I have said to any one. I had no intention to talk about
myself."
"I am sure that you will succeed," said Phineas.
"Yes;--I shall succeed. I am succeeding. I live upon what I earn,
like a gentleman, and can already afford to be indifferent to work
that I dislike. After all, the other part of it,--that of which I
dream,--is but an unnecessary adjunct; the gilding on the
gingerbread. I am inclined to think that the cake is more wholesome
without it."
Phineas did not go up-stairs into Mrs. Low's drawing-room on that
evening, nor did he stay very late with Mr. Low. He had heard enough
of counsel to make him very unhappy,--to shake from him much of the
audacity which he had acquired for himself during his morning's
walk,--and to make him almost doubt whether, after all, the
Chiltern Hundreds would not be for him the safest escape from his
difficulties. But in that case he must never venture to see Lady
Laura Standish again.
CHAPTER VI
Lord Brentford's Dinner
No;--in such case as that,--should he resolve upon taking the advice
of his old friend Mr. Low, Phineas Finn must make up his mind never
to see Lady Laura Standish again! And he was in love with Lady Laura
Standish;--and, for aught he knew, Lady Laura Standish might be in
love with him. As he walked home from Mr. Low's house in Bedford
Square, he was by no means a triumphant man. There had been much more
said between him and Mr. Low than could be laid before the reader
in the last chapter. Mr. Low had urged him again and again, and had
prevailed so far that Phineas, before he left the house, had promised
to consider that suicidal expedient of the Chiltern Hundreds. What a
by-word he would become if he were to give up Parliament, having sat
there for about a week! But such immediate giving up was one of the
necessities of Mr. Low's programme. According to Mr. Low's teaching,
a single year passed amidst the miasma of the House of Commons would
be altogether fatal to any chance of professional success. And Mr.
Low had at any rate succeeded in making Phineas believe that he
was right in this lesson. There was his profession, as to which Mr.
Low assured him that success was within his reach; and there was
Parliament on the other side, as to which he knew that the chances
were all against him, in spite of his advantage of a seat. That he
could not combine the two, beginning with Parliament, he did believe.
Which should it be? That was the question which he tried to decide
as he walked home from Bedford Square to Great Marlborough Street.
He could not answer the question satisfactorily, and went to bed an
unhappy man.
He must at any rate go to Lord Brentford's dinner on Wednesday, and,
to enable him to join in the conversation there, must attend the
debates on Monday and Tuesday. The reader may perhaps be best made to
understand how terrible was our hero's state of doubt by being told
that for awhile he thought of absenting himself from these debates,
as being likely to weaken his purpose of withdrawing altogether from
the House. It is not very often that so strong a fury rages between
party and party at the commencement of the session that a division
is taken upon the Address. It is customary for the leader of the
opposition on such occasions to express his opinion in the most
courteous language, that his right honourable friend, sitting
opposite to him on the Treasury bench, has been, is, and will be
wrong in everything that he thinks, says, or does in public life; but
that, as anything like factious opposition is never adopted on that
side of the House, the Address to the Queen, in answer to that most
fatuous speech which has been put into her Majesty's gracious mouth,
shall be allowed to pass unquestioned. Then the leader of the House
thanks his adversary for his consideration, explains to all men how
happy the country ought to be that the Government has not fallen into
the disgracefully incapable hands of his right honourable friend
opposite; and after that the Address is carried amidst universal
serenity. But such was not the order of the day on the present
occasion. Mr. Mildmay, the veteran leader of the liberal side of the
House, had moved an amendment to the Address, and had urged upon the
House, in very strong language, the expediency of showing, at the
very commencement of the session, that the country had returned
to Parliament a strong majority determined not to put up with
Conservative inactivity. "I conceive it to be my duty," Mr. Mildmay
had said, "at once to assume that the country is unwilling that the
right honourable gentlemen opposite should keep their seats on the
bench upon which they sit, and in the performance of that duty I am
called upon to divide the House upon the Address to her Majesty." And
if Mr. Mildmay used strong language, the reader may be sure that Mr.
Mildmay's followers used language much stronger. And Mr. Daubeny, who
was the present leader of the House, and representative there of the
Ministry,--Lord de Terrier, the Premier, sitting in the House of
Lords,--was not the man to allow these amenities to pass by without
adequate replies. He and his friends were very strong in sarcasm,
if they failed in argument, and lacked nothing for words, though
it might perhaps be proved that they were short in numbers. It was
considered that the speech in which Mr. Daubeny reviewed the long
political life of Mr. Mildmay, and showed that Mr. Mildmay had been
at one time a bugbear, and then a nightmare, and latterly simply a
fungus, was one of the severest attacks, if not the most severe, that
had been heard in that House since the Reform Bill. Mr. Mildmay, the
while, was sitting with his hat low down over his eyes, and many men
said that he did not like it. But this speech was not made till after
that dinner at Lord Brentford's, of which a short account must be
given.
Had it not been for the overwhelming interest of the doings in
Parliament at the commencement of the session, Phineas might have
perhaps abstained from attending, in spite of the charm of novelty.
For, in truth, Mr. Low's words had moved him much. But if it was to
be his fate to be a member of Parliament only for ten days, surely it
would be well that he should take advantage of the time to hear such
a debate as this. It would be a thing to talk of to his children in
twenty years' time, or to his grandchildren in fifty;--and it would
be essentially necessary that he should be able to talk of it to Lady
Laura Standish. He did, therefore, sit in the House till one on the
Monday night, and till two on the Tuesday night, and heard the debate
adjourned till the Thursday. On the Thursday Mr. Daubeny was to make
his great speech, and then the division would come.
When Phineas entered Lady Laura's drawing-room on the Wednesday
before dinner, he found the other guests all assembled. Why men
should have been earlier in keeping their dinner engagements on that
day than on any other he did not understand; but it was the fact,
probably, that the great anxiety of the time made those who were at
all concerned in the matter very keen to hear and to be heard. During
these days everybody was in a hurry,--everybody was eager; and there
was a common feeling that not a minute was to be lost. There were
three ladies in the room,--Lady Laura, Miss Fitzgibbon, and Mrs.
Bonteen. The latter was the wife of a gentleman who had been a junior
Lord of the Admiralty in the late Government, and who lived in the
expectation of filling, perhaps, some higher office in the Government
which, as he hoped, was soon to be called into existence. There
were five gentlemen besides Phineas Finn himself,--Mr. Bonteen, Mr.
Kennedy, Mr. Fitzgibbon, Barrington Erle, who had been caught in
spite of all that Lady Laura had said as to the difficulty of such
an operation, and Lord Brentford. Phineas was quick to observe that
every male guest was in Parliament, and to tell himself that he would
not have been there unless he also had had a seat.
"We are all here now," said the Earl, ringing the bell.
"I hope I've not kept you waiting," said Phineas.
"Not at all," said Lady Laura. "I do not know why we are in such a
hurry. And how many do you say it will be, Mr. Finn?"
"Seventeen, I suppose," said Phineas.
"More likely twenty-two," said Mr. Bonteen. "There is Colcleugh so
ill they can't possibly bring him up, and young Rochester is at
Vienna, and Gunning is sulking about something, and Moody has lost
his eldest son. By George! they pressed him to come up, although
Frank Moody won't be buried till Friday."
"I don't believe it," said Lord Brentford.
"You ask some of the Carlton fellows, and they'll own it."
"If I'd lost every relation I had in the world," said Fitzgibbon,
"I'd vote on such a question as this. Staying away won't bring poor
Frank Moody back to life."
"But there's a decency in these matters, is there not, Mr.
Fitzgibbon?" said Lady Laura.
"I thought they had thrown all that kind of thing overboard long
ago," said Miss Fitzgibbon. "It would be better that they should have
no veil, than squabble about the thickness of it."
Then dinner was announced. The Earl walked off with Miss Fitzgibbon,
Barrington Erle took Mrs. Bonteen, and Mr. Fitzgibbon took Lady
Laura.
"I'll bet four pounds to two it's over nineteen," said Mr. Bonteen,
as he passed through the drawing-room door. The remark seemed to have
been addressed to Mr. Kennedy, and Phineas therefore made no reply.
"I daresay it will," said Kennedy, "but I never bet."
"But you vote--sometimes, I hope," said Bonteen.
"Sometimes," said Mr. Kennedy.
"I think he is the most odious man that ever I set my eyes on," said
Phineas to himself as he followed Mr. Kennedy into the dining-room.
He had observed that Mr. Kennedy had been standing very near to Lady
Laura in the drawing-room, and that Lady Laura had said a few words
to him. He was more determined than ever that he would hate Mr.
Kennedy, and would probably have been moody and unhappy throughout
the whole dinner had not Lady Laura called him to a chair at her left
hand. It was very generous of her; and the more so, as Mr. Kennedy
had, in a half-hesitating manner, prepared to seat himself in that
very place. As it was, Phineas and Mr. Kennedy were neighbours, but
Phineas had the place of honour.
"I suppose you will not speak during the debate?" said Lady Laura.
"Who? I? Certainly not. In the first place, I could not get a
hearing, and, in the next place, I should not think of commencing on
such an occasion. I do not know that I shall ever speak at all."
"Indeed you will. You are just the sort of man who will succeed with
the House. What I doubt is, whether you will do as well in office."
"I wish I might have the chance."
"Of course you can have the chance if you try for it. Beginning so
early, and being on the right side,--and, if you will allow me to say
so, among the right set,--there can be no doubt that you may take
office if you will. But I am not sure that you will be tractable. You
cannot begin, you know, by being Prime Minister."
"I have seen enough to realise that already," said Phineas.
"If you will only keep that little fact steadily before your eyes,
there is nothing you may not reach in official life. But Pitt was
Prime Minister at four-and-twenty, and that precedent has ruined half
our young politicians."
"It has not affected me, Lady Laura."
"As far as I can see, there is no great difficulty in government. A
man must learn to have words at command when he is on his legs in
the House of Commons, in the same way as he would if he were talking
to his own servants. He must keep his temper; and he must be very
patient. As far as I have seen Cabinet Ministers, they are not more
clever than other people."
"I think there are generally one or two men of ability in the
Cabinet."
"Yes, of fair ability. Mr. Mildmay is a good specimen. There is not,
and never was, anything brilliant in him. He is not eloquent, nor,
as far as I am aware, did he ever create anything. But he has always
been a steady, honest, persevering man, and circumstances have made
politics come easy to him."
"Think of the momentous questions which he has been called upon to
decide," said Phineas.
"Every question so handled by him has been decided rightly according
to his own party, and wrongly according to the party opposite. A
political leader is so sure of support and so sure of attack, that
it is hardly necessary for him to be even anxious to be right. For
the country's sake, he should have officials under him who know the
routine of business."
"You think very badly then of politics as a profession."
"No; I think of them very highly. It must be better to deal with
the repeal of laws than the defending of criminals. But all this is
papa's wisdom, not mine. Papa has never been in the Cabinet yet, and
therefore of course he is a little caustic."
"I think he was quite right," said Barrington Erle stoutly. He spoke
so stoutly that everybody at the table listened to him.
"I don't exactly see the necessity for such internecine war just at
present," said Lord Brentford.
"I must say I do," said the other. "Lord de Terrier took office
knowing that he was in a minority. We had a fair majority of nearly
thirty when he came in."
"Then how very soft you must have been to go out," said Miss
Fitzgibbon.
"Not in the least soft," continued Barrington Erle. "We could not
command our men, and were bound to go out. For aught we knew, some
score of them might have chosen to support Lord de Terrier, and then
we should have owned ourselves beaten for the time."
"You were beaten,--hollow," said Miss Fitzgibbon.
"Then why did Lord de Terrier dissolve?"
"A Prime Minister is quite right to dissolve in such a position,"
said Lord Brentford. "He must do so for the Queen's sake. It is his
only chance."
"Just so. It is, as you say, his only chance, and it is his right.
His very possession of power will give him near a score of votes, and
if he thinks that he has a chance, let him try it. We maintain that
he had no chance, and that he must have known that he had none;--that
if he could not get on with the late House, he certainly could not
get on with a new House. We let him have his own way as far as we
could in February. We had failed last summer, and if he could get
along he was welcome. But he could not get along."
"I must say I think he was right to dissolve," said Lady Laura.
"And we are right to force the consequences upon him as quickly as
we can. He practically lost nine seats by his dissolution. Look at
Loughshane."
"Yes; look at Loughshane," said Miss Fitzgibbon. "The country at any
rate has gained something there."
"It's an ill wind that blows nobody any good, Mr. Finn," said the
Earl.
"What on earth is to become of poor George?" said Mr. Fitzgibbon. "I
wonder whether any one knows where he is. George wasn't a bad sort of
fellow."
"Roby used to think that he was a very bad fellow," said Mr. Bonteen.
"Roby used to swear that it was hopeless trying to catch him." It may
be as well to explain that Mr. Roby was a Conservative gentleman of
great fame who had for years acted as Whip under Mr. Daubeny, and who
now filled the high office of Patronage Secretary to the Treasury. "I
believe in my heart," continued Mr. Bonteen, "that Roby is rejoiced
that poor George Morris should be out in the cold."
"If seats were halveable, he should share mine, for the sake of auld
lang syne," said Laurence Fitzgibbon.
"But not to-morrow night," said Barrington Erle; "the division
to-morrow will be a thing not to be joked with. Upon my word I think
they're right about old Moody. All private considerations should give
way. And as for Gunning, I'd have him up or I'd know the reason why."
"And shall we have no defaulters, Barrington?" asked Lady Laura.
"I'm not going to boast, but I don't know of one for whom we need
blush. Sir Everard Powell is so bad with gout that he can't even bear
any one to look at him, but Ratler says that he'll bring him up." Mr.
Ratler was in those days the Whip on the liberal side of the House.
"Unfortunate wretch!" said Miss Fitzgibbon.
"The worst of it is that he screams in his paroxysms," said Mr.
Bonteen.
"And you mean to say that you'll take him into the lobby," said Lady
Laura.
"Undoubtedly," said Barrington Erle. "Why not? He has no business
with a seat if he can't vote. But Sir Everard is a good man, and
he'll be there if laudanum and bath-chair make it possible."
The same kind of conversation went on during the whole of dinner, and
became, if anything, more animated when the three ladies had left the
room. Mr. Kennedy made but one remark, and then he observed that as
far as he could see a majority of nineteen would be as serviceable
as a majority of twenty. This he said in a very mild voice, and in
a tone that was intended to be expressive of doubt; but in spite of
his humility Barrington Erle flew at him almost savagely,--as though
a liberal member of the House of Commons was disgraced by so mean a
spirit; and Phineas found himself despising the man for his want of
zeal.
"If we are to beat them, let us beat them well," said Phineas.
"Let there be no doubt about it," said Barrington Erle.
"I should like to see every man with a seat polled," said Bonteen.
"Poor Sir Everard!" said Lord Brentford. "It will kill him, no doubt,
but I suppose the seat is safe."
"Oh, yes; Llanwrwsth is quite safe," said Barrington, in his
eagerness omitting to catch Lord Brentford's grim joke.
Phineas went up into the drawing-room for a few minutes after dinner,
and was eagerly desirous of saying a few more words,--he knew not
what words,--to Lady Laura. Mr. Kennedy and Mr. Bonteen had left
the dining-room first, and Phineas again found Mr. Kennedy standing
close to Lady Laura's shoulder. Could it be possible that there was
anything in it? Mr. Kennedy was an unmarried man, with an immense
fortune, a magnificent place, a seat in Parliament, and was not
perhaps above forty years of age. There could be no reason why he
should not ask Lady Laura to be his wife,--except, indeed, that he
did not seem to have sufficient words at command to ask anybody for
anything. But could it be that such a woman as Lady Laura could
accept such a man as Mr. Kennedy because of his wealth, and because
of his fine place,--a man who had not a word to throw to a dog, who
did not seem to be possessed of an idea, who hardly looked like a
gentleman;--so Phineas told himself. But in truth Mr. Kennedy, though
he was a plain, unattractive man, with nothing in his personal
appearance to call for remark, was not unlike a gentleman in his
usual demeanour. Phineas himself, it may be here said, was six feet
high, and very handsome, with bright blue eyes, and brown wavy hair,
and light silken beard. Mrs. Low had told her husband more than once
that he was much too handsome to do any good. Mr. Low, however, had
replied that young Finn had never shown himself to be conscious of
his own personal advantages. "He'll learn it soon enough," said Mrs.
Low. "Some woman will tell him, and then he'll be spoilt." I do not
think that Phineas depended much as yet on his own good looks, but
he felt that Mr. Kennedy ought to be despised by such a one as Lady
Laura Standish, because his looks were not good. And she must despise
him! It could not be that a woman so full of life should be willing
to put up with a man who absolutely seemed to have no life within
him. And yet why was he there, and why was he allowed to hang about
just over her shoulders? Phineas Finn began to feel himself to be an
injured man.
But Lady Laura had the power of dispelling instantly this sense of
injury. She had done it effectually in the dining-room by calling him
to the seat by her side, to the express exclusion of the millionaire,
and she did it again now by walking away from Mr. Kennedy to the spot
on which Phineas had placed himself somewhat sulkily.
"Of course you'll be at the club on Friday morning after the
division," she said.
"No doubt."
"When you leave it, come and tell me what are your impressions, and
what you think of Mr. Daubeny's speech. There'll be nothing done in
the House before four, and you'll be able to run up to me."
"Certainly I will."
"I have asked Mr. Kennedy to come, and Mr. Fitzgibbon. I am so
anxious about it, that I want to hear what different people say.
You know, perhaps, that papa is to be in the Cabinet if there's a
change."
"Is he indeed?"
"Oh yes;--and you'll come up?"
"Of course I will. Do you expect to hear much of an opinion from Mr.
Kennedy?"
"Yes, I do. You don't quite know Mr. Kennedy yet. And you must
remember that he will say more to me than he will to you. He's
not quick, you know, as you are, and he has no enthusiasm on any
subject;--but he has opinions, and sound opinions too." Phineas
felt that Lady Laura was in a slight degree scolding him for the
disrespectful manner in which he had spoken of Mr. Kennedy; and he
felt also that he had committed himself,--that he had shown himself
to be sore, and that she had seen and understood his soreness.
"The truth is I do not know him," said he, trying to correct his
blunder.
"No;--not as yet. But I hope that you may some day, as he is one of
those men who are both useful and estimable."
"I do not know that I can use him," said Phineas; "but if you wish
it, I will endeavour to esteem him."
"I wish you to do both;--but that will all come in due time. I think
it probable that in the early autumn there will be a great gathering
of the real Whig Liberals at Loughlinter;--of those, I mean, who have
their heart in it, and are at the same time gentlemen. If it is so,
I should be sorry that you should not be there. You need not mention
it, but Mr. Kennedy has just said a word about it to papa, and a
word from him always means so much! Well;--good-night; and mind you
come up on Friday. You are going to the club, now, of course. I envy
you men your clubs more than I do the House;--though I feel that
a woman's life is only half a life, as she cannot have a seat in
Parliament."
Then Phineas went away, and walked down to Pall Mall with Laurence
Fitzgibbon. He would have preferred to take his walk alone, but he
could not get rid of his affectionate countryman. He wanted to think
over what had taken place during the evening; and, indeed, he did so
in spite of his friend's conversation. Lady Laura, when she first saw
him after his return to London, had told him how anxious her father
was to congratulate him on his seat, but the Earl had not spoken a
word to him on the subject. The Earl had been courteous, as hosts
customarily are, but had been in no way specially kind to him. And
then Mr. Kennedy! As to going to Loughlinter, he would not do such a
thing,--not though the success of the liberal party were to depend on
it. He declared to himself that there were some things which a man
could not do. But although he was not altogether satisfied with what
had occurred in Portman Square, he felt as he walked down arm-in-arm
with Fitzgibbon that Mr. Low and Mr. Low's counsels must be scattered
to the winds. He had thrown the die in consenting to stand for
Loughshane, and must stand the hazard of the cast.
"Bedad, Phin, my boy, I don't think you're listening to me at all,"
said Laurence Fitzgibbon.
"I'm listening to every word you say," said Phineas.
"And if I have to go down to the ould country again this session,
you'll go with me?"
"If I can I will."
"That's my boy! And it's I that hope you'll have the chance. What's
the good of turning these fellows out if one isn't to get something
for one's trouble?"
CHAPTER VII
Mr. and Mrs. Bunce
It was three o'clock on the Thursday night before Mr. Daubeny's
speech was finished. I do not think that there was any truth in the
allegation made at the time, that he continued on his legs an hour
longer than the necessities of his speech required, in order that
five or six very ancient Whigs might be wearied out and shrink to
their beds. Let a Whig have been ever so ancient and ever so weary,
he would not have been allowed to depart from Westminster Hall that
night. Sir Everard Powell was there in his bath-chair at twelve,
with a doctor on one side of him and a friend on the other, in some
purlieu of the House, and did his duty like a fine old Briton as he
was. That speech of Mr. Daubeny's will never be forgotten by any one
who heard it. Its studied bitterness had perhaps never been equalled,
and yet not a word was uttered for the saying of which he could be
accused of going beyond the limits of parliamentary antagonism. It is
true that personalities could not have been closer, that accusations
of political dishonesty and of almost worse than political cowardice
and falsehood could not have been clearer, that no words in the
language could have attributed meaner motives or more unscrupulous
conduct. But, nevertheless, Mr. Daubeny in all that he said was
parliamentary, and showed himself to be a gladiator thoroughly well
trained for the arena in which he had descended to the combat. His
arrows were poisoned, and his lance was barbed, and his shot was
heated red,--because such things are allowed. He did not poison
his enemies' wells or use Greek fire, because those things are not
allowed. He knew exactly the rules of the combat. Mr. Mildmay sat and
heard him without once raising his hat from his brow, or speaking
a word to his neighbour. Men on both sides of the House said that
Mr. Mildmay suffered terribly; but as Mr. Mildmay uttered no word of
complaint to any one, and was quite ready to take Mr. Daubeny by the
hand the next time they met in company, I do not know that any one
was able to form a true idea of Mr. Mildmay's feelings. Mr. Mildmay
was an impassive man who rarely spoke of his own feelings, and no
doubt sat with his hat low down over his eyes in order that no
man might judge of them on that occasion by the impression on his
features. "If he could have left off half an hour earlier it would
have been perfect as an attack," said Barrington Erle in criticising
Mr. Daubeny's speech, "but he allowed himself to sink into
comparative weakness, and the glory of it was over before the
end."--Then came the division. The Liberals had 333 votes to 314 for
the Conservatives, and therefore counted a majority of 19. It was
said that so large a number of members had never before voted at any
division.
"I own I'm disappointed," said Barrington Erle to Mr. Ratler.
"I thought there would be twenty," said Mr. Ratler. "I never went
beyond that. I knew they would have old Moody up, but I thought
Gunning would have been too hard for them."
"They say they've promised them both peerages."
"Yes;--if they remain in. But they know they're going out."
"They must go, with such a majority against them," said Barrington
Erle.
"Of course they must," said Mr. Ratler. "Lord de Terrier wants
nothing better, but it is rather hard upon poor Daubeny. I never saw
such an unfortunate old Tantalus."
"He gets a good drop of real water now and again, and I don't pity
him in the least. He's clever of course, and has made his own way,
but I've always a feeling that he has no business where he is.
I suppose we shall know all about it at Brooks's by one o'clock
to-morrow."
Phineas, though it had been past five before he went to bed,--for
there had been much triumphant talking to be done among liberal
members after the division,--was up at his breakfast at Mrs. Bunce's
lodgings by nine. There was a matter which he was called upon to
settle immediately in which Mrs. Bunce herself was much interested,
and respecting which he had promised to give an answer on this very
morning. A set of very dingy chambers up two pairs of stairs at No.
9, Old Square, Lincoln's Inn, to which Mr. Low had recommended him to
transfer himself and all his belongings, were waiting his occupation,
should he resolve upon occupying them. If he intended to commence
operations as a barrister, it would be necessary that he should have
chambers and a clerk; and before he had left Mr. Low's house on
Sunday evening he had almost given that gentleman authority to secure
for him these rooms at No. 9. "Whether you remain in Parliament or
no, you must make a beginning," Mr. Low had said; "and how are you
even to pretend to begin if you don't have chambers?" Mr. Low hoped
that he might be able to wean Phineas away from his Parliament
bauble;--that he might induce the young barrister to give up his
madness, if not this session or the next, at any rate before a third
year had commenced. Mr. Low was a persistent man, liking very much
when he did like, and loving very strongly when he did love. He would
have many a tug for Phineas Finn before he would allow that false
Westminster Satan to carry off the prey as altogether his own. If he
could only get Phineas into the dingy chambers he might do much!
But Phineas had now become so imbued with the atmosphere of politics,
had been so breathed upon by Lady Laura and Barrington Erle, that
he could no longer endure the thought of any other life than that
of a life spent among the lobbies. A desire to help to beat the
Conservatives had fastened on his very soul, and almost made Mr. Low
odious in his eyes. He was afraid of Mr. Low, and for the nonce would
not go to him any more;--but he must see the porter at Lincoln's Inn,
he must write a line to Mr. Low, and he must tell Mrs. Bunce that for
the present he would still keep on her rooms. His letter to Mr. Low
was as follows:--
Great Marlborough Street, May, 186--.
MY DEAR LOW,
I have made up my mind against taking the chambers, and am
now off to the Inn to say that I shall not want them. Of
course, I know what you will think of me, and it is very
grievous to me to have to bear the hard judgment of a man
whose opinion I value so highly; but, in the teeth of your
terribly strong arguments, I think that there is something
to be said on my side of the question. This seat in
Parliament has come in my way by chance, and I think it
would be pusillanimous in me to reject it, feeling, as I
do, that a seat in Parliament confers very great honour. I
am, too, very fond of politics, and regard legislation as
the finest profession going. Had I any one dependent on
me, I probably might not be justified in following the
bent of my inclination. But I am all alone in the world,
and therefore have a right to make the attempt. If, after
a trial of one or two sessions, I should fail in that
which I am attempting, it will not even then be too late
to go back to the better way. I can assure you that at any
rate it is not my intention to be idle.
I know very well how you will fret and fume over what I
say, and how utterly I shall fail in bringing you round to
my way of thinking; but as I must write to tell you of my
decision, I cannot refrain from defending myself to the
best of my ability.
Yours always faithfully,
PHINEAS FINN.
Mr. Low received this letter at his chambers, and when he had read
it, he simply pressed his lips closely together, placed the sheet
of paper back in its envelope, and put it into a drawer at his left
hand. Having done this, he went on with what work he had before him,
as though his friend's decision were a matter of no consequence to
him. As far as he was concerned the thing was done, and there should
be an end of it. So he told himself; but nevertheless his mind was
full of it all day; and, though he wrote not a word of answer to
Phineas, he made a reply within his own mind to every one of the
arguments used in the letter. "Great honour! How can there be honour
in what comes, as he says, by chance? He hasn't sense enough to
understand that the honour comes from the mode of winning it, and
from the mode of wearing it; and that the very fact of his being
member for Loughshane at this instant simply proves that Loughshane
should have had no privilege to return a member! No one dependent on
him! Are not his father and his mother and his sisters dependent on
him as long as he must eat their bread till he can earn bread of his
own? He will never earn bread of his own. He will always be eating
bread that others have earned." In this way, before the day was
over, Mr. Low became very angry, and swore to himself that he would
have nothing more to say to Phineas Finn. But yet he found himself
creating plans for encountering and conquering the parliamentary
fiend who was at present so cruelly potent with his pupil. It was not
till the third evening that he told his wife that Finn had made up
his mind not to take chambers. "Then I would have nothing more to say
to him," said Mrs. Low, savagely. "For the present I can have nothing
more to say to him." "But neither now nor ever," said Mrs. Low, with
great emphasis; "he has been false to you." "No," said Mr. Low, who
was a man thoroughly and thoughtfully just at all points; "he has not
been false to me. He has always meant what he has said, when he was
saying it. But he is weak and blind, and flies like a moth to the
candle; one pities the poor moth, and would save him a stump of his
wing if it be possible."
Phineas, when he had written his letter to Mr. Low, started off for
Lincoln's Inn, making his way through the well-known dreary streets
of Soho, and through St. Giles's, to Long Acre. He knew every corner
well, for he had walked the same road almost daily for the last three
years. He had conceived a liking for the route, which he might easily
have changed without much addition to the distance, by passing
through Oxford Street and Holborn; but there was an air of business
on which he prided himself in going by the most direct passage, and
he declared to himself very often that things dreary and dingy to the
eye might be good in themselves. Lincoln's Inn itself is dingy, and
the Law Courts therein are perhaps the meanest in which Equity ever
disclosed herself. Mr. Low's three rooms in the Old Square, each of
them brown with the binding of law books and with the dust collected
on law papers, and with furniture that had been brown always, and had
become browner with years, were perhaps as unattractive to the eye of
a young pupil as any rooms which were ever entered. And the study of
the Chancery law itself is not an alluring pursuit till the mind has
come to have some insight into the beauty of its ultimate object.
Phineas, during his three years' course of reasoning on these things,
had taught himself to believe that things ugly on the outside might
be very beautiful within; and had therefore come to prefer crossing
Poland Street and Soho Square, and so continuing his travels by the
Seven Dials and Long Acre. His morning walk was of a piece with his
morning studies, and he took pleasure in the gloom of both. But now
the taste of his palate had been already changed by the glare of
the lamps in and about palatial Westminster, and he found that St.
Giles's was disagreeable. The ways about Pall Mall and across the
Park to Parliament Street, or to the Treasury, were much pleasanter,
and the new offices in Downing Street, already half built, absorbed
all that interest which he had hitherto been able to take in
the suggested but uncommenced erection of new Law Courts in the
neighbourhood of Lincoln's Inn. As he made his way to the porter's
lodge under the great gateway of Lincoln's Inn, he told himself that
he was glad that he had escaped, at any rate for a while, from a life
so dull and dreary. If he could only sit in chambers at the Treasury
instead of chambers in that old court, how much pleasanter it would
be! After all, as regarded that question of income, it might well be
that the Treasury chambers should be the more remunerative, and the
more quickly remunerative, of the two. And, as he thought, Lady Laura
might be compatible with the Treasury chambers and Parliament, but
could not possibly be made compatible with Old Square, Lincoln's Inn.
But nevertheless there came upon him a feeling of sorrow when the
old man at the lodge seemed to be rather glad than otherwise that
he did not want the chambers. "Then Mr. Green can have them," said
the porter; "that'll be good news for Mr. Green. I don't know what
the gen'lemen 'll do for chambers if things goes on as they're
going." Mr. Green was welcome to the chambers as far as Phineas was
concerned; but Phineas felt nevertheless a certain amount of regret
that he should have been compelled to abandon a thing which was
regarded both by the porter and by Mr. Green as being so desirable.
He had however written his letter to Mr. Low, and made his promise to
Barrington Erle, and was bound to Lady Laura Standish; and he walked
out through the old gateway into Chancery Lane, resolving that he
would not even visit Lincoln's Inn again for a year. There were
certain books,--law books,--which he would read at such intervals of
leisure as politics might give him; but within the precincts of the
Inns of Court he would not again put his foot for twelve months, let
learned pundits of the law,--such for instance as Mr. and Mrs.
Low,--say what they might.
He had told Mrs. Bunce, before he left his home after breakfast, that
he should for the present remain under her roof. She had been much
gratified, not simply because lodgings in Great Marlborough Street
are less readily let than chambers in Lincoln's Inn, but also because
it was a great honour to her to have a member of Parliament in her
house. Members of Parliament are not so common about Oxford Street as
they are in the neighbourhood of Pall Mall and St. James's Square.
But Mr. Bunce, when he came home to his dinner, did not join as
heartily as he should have done in his wife's rejoicing. Mr. Bunce
was in the employment of certain copying law-stationers in Carey
Street, and had a strong belief in the law as a profession;--but he
had none whatever in the House of Commons. "And he's given up going
into chambers?" said Mr. Bunce to his wife.
"Given it up altogether for the present," said Mrs. Bunce.
"And he don't mean to have no clerk?" said Mr. Bunce.
"Not unless it is for his Parliament work."
"There ain't no clerks wanted for that, and what's worse, there ain't
no fees to pay 'em. I'll tell you what it is, Jane;--if you don't
look sharp there won't be nothing to pay you before long."
"And he in Parliament, Jacob!"
"There ain't no salary for being in Parliament. There are scores of
them Parliament gents ain't got so much as'll pay their dinners for
'em. And then if anybody does trust 'em, there's no getting at 'em
to make 'em pay as there is at other folk."
"I don't know that our Mr. Phineas will ever be like that, Jacob."
"That's gammon, Jane. That's the way as women gets themselves took in
always. Our Mr. Phineas! Why should our Mr. Phineas be better than
anybody else?"
"He's always acted handsome, Jacob."
"There was one time he could not pay his lodgings for wellnigh nine
months, till his governor come down with the money. I don't know
whether that was handsome. It knocked me about terrible, I know."
"He always meant honest, Jacob."
"I don't know that I care much for a man's meaning when he runs
short of money. How is he going to see his way, with his seat in
Parliament, and this giving up of his profession? He owes us near a
quarter now."
"He paid me two months this morning, Jacob; so he don't owe a
farthing."
"Very well;--so much the better for us. I shall just have a few words
with Mr. Low, and see what he says to it. For myself I don't think
half so much of Parliament folk as some do. They're for promising
everything before they's elected; but not one in twenty of 'em is as
good as his word when he gets there."
Mr. Bunce was a copying journeyman, who spent ten hours a day in
Carey Street with a pen between his fingers; and after that he would
often spend two or three hours of the night with a pen between his
fingers in Marlborough Street. He was a thoroughly hard-working man,
doing pretty well in the world, for he had a good house over his
head, and always could find raiment and bread for his wife and
eight children; but, nevertheless, he was an unhappy man because he
suffered from political grievances, or, I should more correctly say,
that his grievances were semi-political and semi-social. He had no
vote, not being himself the tenant of the house in Great Marlborough
Street. The tenant was a tailor who occupied the shop, whereas Bunce
occupied the whole of the remainder of the premises. He was a lodger,
and lodgers were not as yet trusted with the franchise. And he had
ideas, which he himself admitted to be very raw, as to the injustice
of the manner in which he was paid for his work. So much a folio,
without reference to the way in which his work was done, without
regard to the success of his work, with no questions asked of
himself, was, as he thought, no proper way of remunerating a man for
his labours. He had long since joined a Trade Union, and for two
years past had paid a subscription of a shilling a week towards its
funds. He longed to be doing some battle against his superiors, and
to be putting himself in opposition to his employers;--not that he
objected personally to Messrs. Foolscap, Margin, and Vellum, who
always made much of him as a useful man;--but because some such
antagonism would be manly, and the fighting of some battle would
be the right thing to do. "If Labour don't mean to go to the wall
himself," Bunce would say to his wife, "Labour must look alive, and
put somebody else there."
Mrs. Bunce was a comfortable motherly woman, who loved her husband
but hated politics. As he had an aversion to his superiors in the
world because they were superiors, so had she a liking for them for
the same reason. She despised people poorer than herself, and thought
it a fair subject for boasting that her children always had meat for
dinner. If it was ever so small a morsel, she took care that they had
it, in order that the boast might be maintained. The world had once
or twice been almost too much for her,--when, for instance, her
husband had been ill; and again, to tell the truth, for the last
three months of that long period in which Phineas had omitted to pay
his bills; but she had kept a fine brave heart during those troubles,
and could honestly swear that the children always had a bit of
meat, though she herself had been occasionally without it for days
together. At such times she would be more than ordinarily meek to
Mr. Margin, and especially courteous to the old lady who lodged in
her first-floor drawing-room,--for Phineas lived up two pairs of
stairs,--and she would excuse such servility by declaring that there
was no knowing how soon she might want assistance. But her husband,
in such emergencies, would become furious and quarrelsome, and would
declare that Labour was going to the wall, and that something very
strong must be done at once. That shilling which Bunce paid weekly to
the Union she regarded as being absolutely thrown away,--as much so
as though he cast it weekly into the Thames. And she had told him so,
over and over again, making heart-piercing allusions to the eight
children and to the bit of meat. He would always endeavour to explain
to her that there was no other way under the sun for keeping Labour
from being sent to the wall;--but he would do so hopelessly and
altogether ineffectually, and she had come to regard him as a lunatic
to the extent of that one weekly shilling.
She had a woman's instinctive partiality for comeliness in a man, and
was very fond of Phineas Finn because he was handsome. And now she
was very proud of him because he was a member of Parliament. She
had heard,--from her husband, who had told her the fact with much
disgust,--that the sons of Dukes and Earls go into Parliament, and
she liked to think that the fine young man to whom she talked more
or less every day should sit with the sons of Dukes and Earls. When
Phineas had really brought distress upon her by owing her some thirty
or forty pounds, she could never bring herself to be angry with
him,--because he was handsome and because he dined out with Lords.
And she had triumphed greatly over her husband, who had desired to be
severe upon his aristocratic debtor, when the money had all been paid
in a lump.
"I don't know that he's any great catch," Bunce had said, when the
prospect of their lodger's departure had been debated between them.
"Jacob," said his wife, "I don't think you feel it when you've got
people respectable about you."
"The only respectable man I know," said Jacob, "is the man as earns
his bread; and Mr. Finn, as I take it, is a long way from that yet."
Phineas returned to his lodgings before he went down to his club, and
again told Mrs. Bunce that he had altogether made up his mind about
the chambers. "If you'll keep me I shall stay here for the first
session I daresay."
"Of course we shall be only too proud, Mr. Finn; and though it mayn't
perhaps be quite the place for a member of Parliament--"
"But I think it is quite the place."
"It's very good of you to say so, Mr. Finn, and we'll do our very
best to make you comfortable. Respectable we are, I may say; and
though Bunce is a bit rough sometimes--"
"Never to me, Mrs. Bunce."
"But he is rough,--and silly, too, with his radical nonsense, paying
a shilling a week to a nasty Union just for nothing. Still he means
well, and there ain't a man who works harder for his wife and
children;--that I will say of him. And if he do talk politics--"
"But I like a man to talk politics, Mrs. Bunce."
"For a gentleman in Parliament of course it's proper; but I never
could see what good it could do to a law-stationer; and when he talks
of Labour going to the wall, I always ask him whether he didn't get
his wages regular last Saturday. But, Lord love you, Mr. Finn, when a
man as is a journeyman has took up politics and joined a Trade Union,
he ain't no better than a milestone for his wife to take and talk to
him."
After that Phineas went down to the Reform Club, and made one of
those who were buzzing there in little crowds and uttering their
prophecies as to future events. Lord de Terrier was to go out. That
was certain. Whether Mr. Mildmay was to come in was uncertain. That
he would go to Windsor to-morrow morning was not to be doubted; but
it was thought very probable that he might plead his age, and decline
to undertake the responsibility of forming a Ministry.
"And what then?" said Phineas to his friend Fitzgibbon.
"Why, then there will be a choice out of three. There is the Duke,
who is the most incompetent man in England; there is Monk, who is the
most unfit; and there is Gresham, who is the most unpopular. I can't
conceive it possible to find a worse Prime Minister than either of
the three;--but the country affords no other."
"And which would Mildmay name?"
"All of them,--one after the other, so as to make the embarrassment
the greater." That was Mr. Fitzgibbon's description of the crisis;
but then it was understood that Mr. Fitzgibbon was given to
romancing.
CHAPTER VIII
The News about Mr. Mildmay and Sir Everard
Fitzgibbon and Phineas started together from Pall Mall for Portman
Square,--as both of them had promised to call on Lady Laura,--but
Fitzgibbon turned in at Brooks's as they walked up St. James's
Square, and Phineas went on by himself in a cab. "You should belong
here," said Fitzgibbon as his friend entered the cab, and Phineas
immediately began to feel that he would have done nothing till he
could get into Brooks's. It might be very well to begin by talking
politics at the Reform Club. Such talking had procured for him his
seat at Loughshane. But that was done now, and something more than
talking was wanted for any further progress. Nothing, as he told
himself, of political import was managed at the Reform Club. No
influence from thence was ever brought to bear upon the adjustment of
places under the Government, or upon the arrangement of cabinets. It
might be very well to count votes at the Reform Club; but after the
votes had been counted,--had been counted successfully,--Brooks's was
the place, as Phineas believed, to learn at the earliest moment what
would be the exact result of the success. He must get into Brooks's,
if it might be possible for him. Fitzgibbon was not exactly the man
to propose him. Perhaps the Earl of Brentford would do it.
Lady Laura was at home, and with her was sitting--Mr. Kennedy.
Phineas had intended to be triumphant as he entered Lady Laura's
room. He was there with the express purpose of triumphing in the
success of their great party, and of singing a pleasant paean in
conjunction with Lady Laura. But his trumpet was put out of tune at
once when he saw Mr. Kennedy. He said hardly a word as he gave his
hand to Lady Laura,--and then afterwards to Mr. Kennedy, who chose
to greet him with this show of cordiality.
"I hope you are satisfied, Mr. Finn," said Lady Laura, laughing.
"Oh yes."
"And is that all? I thought to have found your joy quite
irrepressible."
"A bottle of soda-water, though it is a very lively thing when
opened, won't maintain its vivacity beyond a certain period, Lady
Laura."
"And you have had your gas let off already?"
"Well,--yes; at any rate, the sputtering part of it. Nineteen is very
well, but the question is whether we might not have had twenty-one."
"Mr. Kennedy has just been saying that not a single available vote
has been missed on our side. He has just come from Brooks's, and that
seems to be what they say there."
So Mr. Kennedy also was a member of Brooks's! At the Reform Club
there certainly had been an idea that the number might have been
swelled to twenty-one; but then, as Phineas began to understand,
nothing was correctly known at the Reform Club. For an accurate
appreciation of the political balance of the day, you must go to
Brooks's.
"Mr. Kennedy must of course be right," said Phineas. "I don't
belong to Brooks's myself. But I was only joking, Lady Laura. There
is, I suppose, no doubt that Lord de Terrier is out, and that is
everything."
"He has probably tendered his resignation," said Mr. Kennedy.
"That is the same thing," said Phineas, roughly.
"Not exactly," said Lady Laura. "Should there be any difficulty about
Mr. Mildmay, he might, at the Queen's request, make another attempt."
"With a majority of nineteen against him!" said Phineas. "Surely Mr.
Mildmay is not the only man in the country. There is the Duke, and
there is Mr. Gresham,--and there is Mr. Monk." Phineas had at his
tongue's end all the lesson that he had been able to learn at the
Reform Club.
"I should hardly think the Duke would venture," said Mr. Kennedy.
"Nothing venture, nothing have," said Phineas. "It is all very well
to say that the Duke is incompetent, but I do not know that anything
very wonderful is required in the way of genius. The Duke has held
his own in both Houses successfully, and he is both honest and
popular. I quite agree that a Prime Minister at the present day
should be commonly honest, and more than commonly popular."
"So you are all for the Duke, are you?" said Lady Laura, again
smiling as she spoke to him.
"Certainly;--if we are deserted by Mr. Mildmay. Don't you think so?"
"I don't find it quite so easy to make up my mind as you do. I am
inclined to think that Mr. Mildmay will form a government; and as
long as there is that prospect, I need hardly commit myself to an
opinion as to his probable successor." Then the objectionable Mr.
Kennedy took his leave, and Phineas was left alone with Lady Laura.
"It is glorious;--is it not?" he began, as soon as he found the field
to be open for himself and his own manoeuvring. But he was very
young, and had not as yet learned the manner in which he might best
advance his cause with such a woman as Lady Laura Standish. He was
telling her too clearly that he could have no gratification in
talking with her unless he could be allowed to have her all to
himself. That might be very well if Lady Laura were in love with him,
but would hardly be the way to reduce her to that condition.
"Mr. Finn," said she, smiling as she spoke, "I am sure that you did
not mean it, but you were uncourteous to my friend Mr. Kennedy."
"Who? I? Was I? Upon my word, I didn't intend to be uncourteous."
"If I had thought you had intended it, of course I could not tell you
of it. And now I take the liberty;--for it is a liberty--"
"Oh no."
"Because I feel so anxious that you should do nothing to mar your
chances as a rising man."
"You are only too kind to me,--always."
"I know how clever you are, and how excellent are all your instincts;
but I see that you are a little impetuous. I wonder whether you will
be angry if I take upon myself the task of mentor."
"Nothing you could say would make me angry,--though you might make me
very unhappy."
"I will not do that if I can help it. A mentor ought to be very old,
you know, and I am infinitely older than you are."
"I should have thought it was the reverse;--indeed, I may say that I
know that it is," said Phineas.
"I am not talking of years. Years have very little to do with the
comparative ages of men and women. A woman at forty is quite old,
whereas a man at forty is young." Phineas, remembering that he had
put down Mr. Kennedy's age as forty in his own mind, frowned when
he heard this, and walked about the room in displeasure. "And
therefore," continued Lady Laura, "I talk to you as though I were a
kind of grandmother."
"You shall be my great-grandmother if you will only be kind enough to
me to say what you really think."
"You must not then be so impetuous, and you must be a little
more careful to be civil to persons to whom you may not take any
particular fancy. Now Mr. Kennedy is a man who may be very useful to
you."
"I do not want Mr. Kennedy to be of use to me."
"That is what I call being impetuous,--being young,--being a boy. Why
should not Mr. Kennedy be of use to you as well as any one else? You
do not mean to conquer the world all by yourself."
"No;--but there is something mean to me in the expressed idea that
I should make use of any man,--and more especially of a man whom I
don't like."
"And why do you not like him, Mr. Finn?"
"Because he is one of my Dr. Fells."
"You don't like him simply because he does not talk much. That
may be a good reason why you should not make of him an intimate
companion,--because you like talkative people; but it should be no
ground for dislike."
Phineas paused for a moment before he answered her, thinking whether
or not it would be well to ask her some question which might produce
from her a truth which he would not like to hear. Then he did ask it.
"And do you like him?" he said.
She too paused, but only for a second. "Yes,--I think I may say that
I do like him."
"No more than that?"
"Certainly no more than that;--but that I think is a great deal."
"I wonder what you would say if any one asked you whether you liked
me," said Phineas, looking away from her through the window.
"Just the same;--but without the doubt, if the person who questioned
me had any right to ask the question. There are not above one or two
who could have such a right."
"And I was wrong, of course, to ask it about Mr. Kennedy," said
Phineas, looking out into the Square.
"I did not say so."
"But I see you think it."
"You see nothing of the kind. I was quite willing to be asked the
question by you, and quite willing to answer it. Mr. Kennedy is a man
of great wealth."
"What can that have to do with it?"
"Wait a moment, you impetuous Irish boy, and hear me out." Phineas
liked being called an impetuous Irish boy, and came close to her,
sitting where he could look up into her face; and there came a smile
upon his own, and he was very handsome. "I say that he is a man of
great wealth," continued Lady Laura; "and as wealth gives influence,
he is of great use,--politically,--to the party to which he belongs."
"Oh, politically!"
"Am I to suppose you care nothing for politics? To such men, to men
who think as you think, who are to sit on the same benches with
yourself, and go into the same lobby and be seen at the same club,
it is your duty to be civil both for your own sake and for that of
the cause. It is for the hermits of society to indulge in personal
dislikings,--for men who have never been active and never mean to be
active. I had been telling Mr. Kennedy how much I thought of you,--as
a good Liberal."
"And I came in and spoilt it all."
"Yes, you did. You knocked down my little house, and I must build it
all up again."
"Don't trouble yourself, Lady Laura."
"I shall. It will be a great deal of trouble,--a great deal, indeed;
but I shall take it. I mean you to be very intimate with Mr. Kennedy,
and to shoot his grouse, and to stalk his deer, and to help to
keep him in progress as a liberal member of Parliament. I am quite
prepared to admit, as a friend, that he would go back without some
such help."
"Oh;--I understand."
"I do not believe that you do understand at all, but I must endeavour
to make you do so by degrees. If you are to be my political pupil,
you must at any rate be obedient. The next time you meet Mr. Kennedy,
ask him his opinion instead of telling him your own. He has been in
Parliament twelve years, and he was a good deal older than you when
he began." At this moment a side door was opened, and the red-haired,
red-bearded man whom Phineas had seen before entered the room. He
hesitated a moment, as though he were going to retreat again, and
then began to pull about the books and toys which lay on one of the
distant tables, as though he were in quest of some article. And he
would have retreated had not Lady Laura called to him.
"Oswald," she said, "let me introduce you to Mr. Finn. Mr. Finn, I do
not think you have ever met my brother, Lord Chiltern." Then the two
young men bowed, and each of them muttered something. "Do not be in a
hurry, Oswald. You have nothing special to take you away. Here is Mr.
Finn come to tell us who are all the possible new Prime Ministers. He
is uncivil enough not to have named papa."
"My father is out of the question," said Lord Chiltern.
"Of course he is," said Lady Laura, "but I may be allowed my little
joke."
"I suppose he will at any rate be in the Cabinet," said Phineas.
"I know nothing whatever about politics," said Lord Chiltern.
"I wish you did," said his sister,--"with all my heart."
"I never did,--and I never shall, for all your wishing. It's the
meanest trade going I think, and I'm sure it's the most dishonest.
They talk of legs on the turf, and of course there are legs; but what
are they to the legs in the House? I don't know whether you are in
Parliament, Mr. Finn."
"Yes, I am; but do not mind me."
"I beg your pardon. Of course there are honest men there, and no
doubt you are one of them."
"He is indifferent honest,--as yet," said Lady Laura.
"I was speaking of men who go into Parliament to look after
Government places," said Lord Chiltern.
"That is just what I'm doing," said Phineas. "Why should not a man
serve the Crown? He has to work very hard for what he earns."
"I don't believe that the most of them work at all. However, I beg
your pardon. I didn't mean you in particular."
"Mr. Finn is such a thorough politician that he will never forgive
you," said Lady Laura.
"Yes, I will," said Phineas, "and I'll convert him some day. If he
does come into the House, Lady Laura, I suppose he'll come on the
right side?"
"I'll never go into the House, as you call it," said Lord Chiltern.
"But, I'll tell you what; I shall be very happy if you'll dine with
me to-morrow at Moroni's. They give you a capital little dinner at
Moroni's, and they've the best Château Yquem in London."
"Do," said Lady Laura, in a whisper. "Oblige me."
Phineas was engaged to dine with one of the Vice-Chancellors on the
day named. He had never before dined at the house of this great law
luminary, whose acquaintance he had made through Mr. Low, and he had
thought a great deal of the occasion. Mrs. Freemantle had sent him
the invitation nearly a fortnight ago, and he understood there was to
be an elaborate dinner party. He did not know it for a fact, but he
was in hopes of meeting the expiring Lord Chancellor. He considered
it to be his duty never to throw away such a chance. He would in
all respects have preferred Mr. Freemantle's dinner in Eaton Place,
dull and heavy though it might probably be, to the chance of Lord
Chiltern's companions at Moroni's. Whatever might be the faults of
our hero, he was not given to what is generally called dissipation
by the world at large,--by which the world means self-indulgence. He
cared not a brass farthing for Moroni's Château Yquem, nor for the
wondrously studied repast which he would doubtless find prepared for
him at that celebrated establishment in St. James's Street;--not a
farthing as compared with the chance of meeting so great a man as
Lord Moles. And Lord Chiltern's friends might probably be just the
men whom he would not desire to know. But Lady Laura's request
overrode everything with him. She had asked him to oblige her, and of
course he would do so. Had he been going to dine with the incoming
Prime Minister, he would have put off his engagement at her request.
He was not quick enough to make an answer without hesitation; but
after a moment's pause he said he should be most happy to dine with
Lord Chiltern at Moroni's.
"That's right; 7.30 sharp,--only I can tell you you won't meet any
other members." Then the servant announced more visitors, and Lord
Chiltern escaped out of the room before he was seen by the new
comers. These were Mrs. Bonteen and Laurence Fitzgibbon, and then Mr.
Bonteen,--and after them Mr. Ratler, the Whip, who was in a violent
hurry, and did not stay there a moment, and then Barrington Erle and
young Lord James Fitz-Howard, the youngest son of the Duke of St.
Bungay. In twenty or thirty minutes there was a gathering of liberal
political notabilities in Lady Laura's drawing-room. There were two
great pieces of news by which they were all enthralled. Mr. Mildmay
would not be Prime Minister, and Sir Everard Powell was--dead. Of
course nothing quite positive could be known about Mr. Mildmay. He
was to be with the Queen at Windsor on the morrow at eleven o'clock,
and it was improbable that he would tell his mind to any one before
he told it to her Majesty. But there was no doubt that he had engaged
"the Duke,"--so he was called by Lord James,--to go down to Windsor
with him, that he might be in readiness if wanted. "I have learned
that at home," said Lord James, who had just heard the news from his
sister, who had heard it from the Duchess. Lord James was delighted
with the importance given to him by his father's coming journey.
From this, and from other equally well-known circumstances, it was
surmised that Mr. Mildmay would decline the task proposed to him.
This, nevertheless, was only a surmise,--whereas the fact with
reference to Sir Everard was fully substantiated. The gout had flown
to his stomach, and he was dead. "By ---- yes; as dead as a herring,"
said Mr. Ratler, who at that moment, however, was not within hearing
of either of the ladies present. And then he rubbed his hands, and
looked as though he were delighted. And he was delighted,--not
because his old friend Sir Everard was dead, but by the excitement
of the tragedy. "Having done so good a deed in his last moments,"
said Laurence Fitzgibbon, "we may take it for granted that he will
go straight to heaven." "I hope there will be no crowner's quest,
Ratler," said Mr. Bonteen; "if there is I don't know how you'll
get out of it." "I don't see anything in it so horrible," said
Mr. Ratler. "If a fellow dies leading his regiment we don't think
anything of it. Sir Everard's vote was of more service to his country
than anything that a colonel or a captain can do." But nevertheless
I think that Mr. Ratler was somewhat in dread of future newspaper
paragraphs, should it be found necessary to summon a coroner's
inquisition to sit upon poor Sir Everard.
While this was going on Lady Laura took Phineas apart for a moment.
"I am so much obliged to you; I am indeed," she said.
"What nonsense!"
"Never mind whether it's nonsense or not;--but I am. I can't explain
it all now, but I do so want you to know my brother. You may be of
the greatest service to him,--of the very greatest. He is not half so
bad as people say he is. In many ways he is very good,--very good.
And he is very clever."
"At any rate I will think and believe no ill of him."
"Just so;--do not believe evil of him,--not more evil than you see. I
am so anxious,--so very anxious to try to put him on his legs, and I
find it so difficult to get any connecting link with him. Papa will
not speak with him,--because of money."
"But he is friends with you."
"Yes; I think he loves me. I saw how distasteful it was to you to go
to him;--and probably you were engaged?"
"One can always get off those sort of things if there is an object."
"Yes;--just so. And the object was to oblige me;--was it not?"
"Of course it was. But I must go now. We are to hear Daubeny's
statement at four, and I would not miss it for worlds."
"I wonder whether you would go abroad with my brother in the autumn?
But I have no right to think of such a thing;--have I? At any rate
I will not think of it yet. Good-bye,--I shall see you perhaps on
Sunday if you are in town."
Phineas walked down to Westminster with his mind very full of Lady
Laura and Lord Chiltern. What did she mean by her affectionate
manner to himself, and what did she mean by the continual praises
which she lavished upon Mr. Kennedy? Of whom was she thinking most,
of Mr. Kennedy, or of him? She had called herself his mentor. Was
the description of her feelings towards himself, as conveyed in that
name, of a kind to be gratifying to him? No;--he thought not. But
then might it not be within his power to change the nature of those
feelings? She was not in love with him at present. He could not make
any boast to himself on that head. But it might be within his power
to compel her to love him. The female mentor might be softened. That
she could not love Mr. Kennedy, he thought that he was quite sure.
There was nothing like love in her manner to Mr. Kennedy. As to Lord
Chiltern, Phineas would do whatever might be in his power. All that
he really knew of Lord Chiltern was that he had gambled and that he
had drunk.
CHAPTER IX
The New Government
In the House of Lords that night, and in the House of Commons, the
outgoing Ministers made their explanations. As our business at the
present moment is with the Commons, we will confine ourselves to
their chamber, and will do so the more willingly because the upshot
of what was said in the two places was the same. The outgoing
ministers were very grave, very self-laudatory, and very courteous.
In regard to courtesy it may be declared that no stranger to the
ways of the place could have understood how such soft words could be
spoken by Mr. Daubeny, beaten, so quickly after the very sharp words
which he had uttered when he only expected to be beaten. He announced
to his fellow-commoners that his right honourable friend and
colleague Lord de Terrier had thought it right to retire from the
Treasury. Lord de Terrier, in constitutional obedience to the vote
of the Lower House, had resigned, and the Queen had been graciously
pleased to accept Lord de Terrier's resignation. Mr. Daubeny could
only inform the House that her Majesty had signified her pleasure
that Mr. Mildmay should wait upon her to-morrow at eleven o'clock.
Mr. Mildmay,--so Mr. Daubeny understood,--would be with her Majesty
to-morrow at that hour. Lord de Terrier had found it to be his duty
to recommend her Majesty to send for Mr. Mildmay. Such was the real
import of Mr. Daubeny's speech. That further portion of it in which
he explained with blandest, most beneficent, honey-flowing words that
his party would have done everything that the country could require
of any party, had the House allowed it to remain on the Treasury
benches for a month or two,--and explained also that his party would
never recriminate, would never return evil for evil, would in no wise
copy the factious opposition of their adversaries; that his party
would now, as it ever had done, carry itself with the meekness of
the dove, and the wisdom of the serpent,--all this, I say, was so
generally felt by gentlemen on both sides of the House to be "leather
and prunella" that very little attention was paid to it. The great
point was that Lord de Terrier had resigned, and that Mr. Mildmay had
been summoned to Windsor.
The Queen had sent for Mr. Mildmay in compliance with advice given
to her by Lord de Terrier. And yet Lord de Terrier and his first
lieutenant had used all the most practised efforts of their eloquence
for the last three days in endeavouring to make their countrymen
believe that no more unfitting Minister than Mr. Mildmay ever
attempted to hold the reins of office! Nothing had been too bad
for them to say of Mr. Mildmay,--and yet, in the very first moment
in which they found themselves unable to carry on the Government
themselves, they advised the Queen to send for that most incompetent
and baneful statesman! We who are conversant with our own methods of
politics, see nothing odd in this, because we are used to it; but
surely in the eyes of strangers our practice must be very singular.
There is nothing like it in any other country,--nothing as yet.
Nowhere else is there the same good-humoured, affectionate,
prize-fighting ferocity in politics. The leaders of our two great
parties are to each other exactly as are the two champions of the
ring who knock each other about for the belt and for five hundred
pounds a side once in every two years. How they fly at each other,
striking as though each blow should carry death if it were but
possible! And yet there is no one whom the Birmingham Bantam
respects so highly as he does Bill Burns the Brighton Bully, or with
whom he has so much delight in discussing the merits of a pot of
half-and-half. And so it was with Mr. Daubeny and Mr. Mildmay. In
private life Mr. Daubeny almost adulated his elder rival,--and Mr.
Mildmay never omitted an opportunity of taking Mr. Daubeny warmly by
the hand. It is not so in the United States. There the same political
enmity exists, but the political enmity produces private hatred. The
leaders of parties there really mean what they say when they abuse
each other, and are in earnest when they talk as though they were
about to tear each other limb from limb. I doubt whether Mr. Daubeny
would have injured a hair of Mr. Mildmay's venerable head, even for
an assurance of six continued months in office.
When Mr. Daubeny had completed his statement, Mr. Mildmay simply told
the House that he had received and would obey her Majesty's commands.
The House would of course understand that he by no means meant to
aver that the Queen would even commission him to form a Ministry. But
if he took no such command from her Majesty it would become his duty
to recommend her Majesty to impose the task upon some other person.
Then everything was said that had to be said, and members returned to
their clubs. A certain damp was thrown over the joy of some excitable
Liberals by tidings which reached the House during Mr. Daubeny's
speech. Sir Everard Powell was no more dead than was Mr. Daubeny
himself. Now it is very unpleasant to find that your news is untrue,
when you have been at great pains to disseminate it. "Oh, but he is
dead," said Mr. Ratler. "Lady Powell assured me half an hour ago,"
said Mr. Ratler's opponent, "that he was at that moment a great deal
better than he had been for the last three months. The journey down
to the House did him a world of good." "Then we'll have him down for
every division," said Mr. Ratler.
The political portion of London was in a ferment for the next five
days. On the Sunday morning it was known that Mr. Mildmay had
declined to put himself at the head of a liberal Government. He and
the Duke of St. Bungay, and Mr. Plantagenet Palliser, had been in
conference so often, and so long, that it may almost be said they
lived together in conference. Then Mr. Gresham had been with Mr.
Mildmay,--and Mr. Monk also. At the clubs it was said by many that
Mr. Monk had been with Mr. Mildmay; but it was also said very
vehemently by others that no such interview had taken place. Mr. Monk
was a Radical, much admired by the people, sitting in Parliament for
that most Radical of all constituencies, the Pottery Hamlets, who
had never as yet been in power. It was the great question of the day
whether Mr. Mildmay would or would not ask Mr. Monk to join him; and
it was said by those who habitually think at every period of change
that the time has now come in which the difficulties to forming a
government will at last be found to be insuperable, that Mr. Mildmay
could not succeed either with Mr. Monk or without him. There were at
the present moment two sections of these gentlemen,--the section
which declared that Mr. Mildmay had sent for Mr. Monk, and the
section which declared that he had not. But there were others, who
perhaps knew better what they were saying, by whom it was asserted
that the whole difficulty lay with Mr. Gresham. Mr. Gresham was
willing to serve with Mr. Mildmay,--with certain stipulations as
to the special seat in the Cabinet which he himself was to occupy,
and as to the introduction of certain friends of his own; but,--so
said these gentlemen who were supposed really to understand the
matter,--Mr. Gresham was not willing to serve with the Duke and with
Mr. Palliser. Now, everybody who knew anything knew that the Duke
and Mr. Palliser were indispensable to Mr. Mildmay. And a liberal
Government, with Mr. Gresham in the opposition, could not live half
through a session! All Sunday and Monday these things were discussed;
and on the Monday Lord de Terrier absolutely stated to the Upper
House that he had received her Majesty's commands to form another
government. Mr. Daubeny, in half a dozen most modest words,--in words
hardly audible, and most unlike himself,--made his statement in the
Lower House to the same effect. Then Mr. Ratler, and Mr. Bonteen, and
Mr. Barrington Erle, and Mr. Laurence Fitzgibbon aroused themselves
and swore that such things could not be. Should the prey which they
had won for themselves, the spoil of their bows and arrows, be
snatched from out of their very mouths by treachery? Lord de Terrier
and Mr. Daubeny could not venture even to make another attempt unless
they did so in combination with Mr. Gresham. Such a combination, said
Mr. Barrington Erle, would be disgraceful to both parties, but would
prove Mr. Gresham to be as false as Satan himself. Early on the
Tuesday morning, when it was known that Mr. Gresham had been at Lord
de Terrier's house, Barrington Erle was free to confess that he had
always been afraid of Mr. Gresham. "I have felt for years," said he,
"that if anybody could break up the party it would be Mr. Gresham."
On that Tuesday morning Mr. Gresham certainly was with Lord de
Terrier, but nothing came of it. Mr. Gresham was either not enough
like Satan for the occasion, or else he was too closely like him.
Lord de Terrier did not bid high enough, or else Mr. Gresham did not
like biddings from that quarter. Nothing then came from this attempt,
and on the Tuesday afternoon the Queen again sent for Mr. Mildmay. On
the Wednesday morning the gentlemen who thought that the insuperable
difficulties had at length arrived, began to wear their longest
faces, and to be triumphant with melancholy forebodings. Now at
last there was a dead lock. Nobody could form a government. It
was asserted that Mr. Mildmay had fallen at her Majesty's feet
dissolved in tears, and had implored to be relieved from further
responsibility. It was well known to many at the clubs that the Queen
had on that morning telegraphed to Germany for advice. There were men
so gloomy as to declare that the Queen must throw herself into the
arms of Mr. Monk, unless Mr. Mildmay would consent to rise from his
knees and once more buckle on his ancient armour. "Even that would
be better than Gresham," said Barrington Erle, in his anger. "I'll
tell you what it is," said Ratler, "we shall have Gresham and Monk
together, and you and I shall have to do their biddings." Mr.
Barrington Erle's reply to that suggestion I may not dare to insert
in these pages.
On the Wednesday night, however, it was known that everything had
been arranged, and before the Houses met on the Thursday every place
had been bestowed, either in reality or in imagination. The _Times_,
in its second edition on the Thursday, gave a list of the Cabinet, in
which four places out of fourteen were rightly filled. On the Friday
it named ten places aright, and indicated the law officers, with only
one mistake in reference to Ireland; and on the Saturday it gave
a list of the Under Secretaries of State, and Secretaries and
Vice-Presidents generally, with wonderful correctness as to the
individuals, though the offices were a little jumbled. The Government
was at last formed in a manner which everybody had seen to be the
only possible way in which a government could be formed. Nobody was
surprised, and the week's work was regarded as though the regular
routine of government making had simply been followed. Mr. Mildmay
was Prime Minister; Mr. Gresham was at the Foreign Office; Mr. Monk
was at the Board of Trade; the Duke was President of the Council; the
Earl of Brentford was Privy Seal; and Mr. Palliser was Chancellor of
the Exchequer. Barrington Erle made a step up in the world, and went
to the Admiralty as Secretary; Mr. Bonteen was sent again to the
Admiralty; and Laurence Fitzgibbon became a junior Lord of the
Treasury. Mr. Ratler was, of course, installed as Patronage Secretary
to the same Board. Mr. Ratler was perhaps the only man in the party
as to whose destination there could not possibly be a doubt. Mr.
Ratler had really qualified himself for a position in such a way as
to make all men feel that he would, as a matter of course, be called
upon to fill it. I do not know whether as much could be said on
behalf of any other man in the new Government.
During all this excitement, and through all these movements, Phineas
Finn felt himself to be left more and more out in the cold. He had
not been such a fool as to suppose that any office would be offered
to him. He had never hinted at such a thing to his one dearly
intimate friend, Lady Laura. He had not hitherto opened his mouth in
Parliament. Indeed, when the new Government was formed he had not
been sitting for above a fortnight. Of course nothing could be done
for him as yet. But, nevertheless, he felt himself to be out in the
cold. The very men who had discussed with him the question of the
division,--who had discussed it with him because his vote was then as
good as that of any other member,--did not care to talk to him about
the distribution of places. He, at any rate, could not be one of
them. He, at any rate, could not be a rival. He could neither mar
nor assist. He could not be either a successful or a disappointed
sympathiser,--because he could not himself be a candidate. The affair
which perhaps disgusted him more than anything else was the offer of
an office,--not in the Cabinet, indeed, but one supposed to confer
high dignity,--to Mr. Kennedy. Mr. Kennedy refused the offer, and
this somewhat lessened Finn's disgust, but the offer itself made him
unhappy.
"I suppose it was made simply because of his money," he said to
Fitzgibbon.
"I don't believe that," said Fitzgibbon. "People seem to think that
he has got a head on his shoulders, though he has got no tongue in
it. I wonder at his refusing it because of the Right Honourable."
"I am so glad that Mr. Kennedy refused," said Lady Laura to him.
"And why? He would have been the Right Hon. Robert Kennedy for ever
and ever." Phineas when he said this did not as yet know exactly
how it would have come to pass that such honour,--the honour of the
enduring prefix to his name,--would have come in the way of Mr.
Kennedy had Mr. Kennedy accepted the office in question; but he was
very quick to learn all these things, and, in the meantime, he rarely
made any mistake about them.
"What would that have been to him,--with his wealth?" said Lady
Laura. "He has a position of his own and need not care for such
things. There are men who should not attempt what is called
independence in Parliament. By doing so they simply decline to make
themselves useful. But there are a few whose special walk in life it
is to be independent, and, as it were, unmoved by parties."
"Great Akinetoses! You know Orion," said Phineas.
"Mr. Kennedy is not an Akinetos," said Lady Laura.
"He holds a very proud position," said Phineas, ironically.
"A very proud position indeed," said Lady Laura, in sober earnest.
The dinner at Moroni's had been eaten, and Phineas had given an
account of the entertainment to Lord Chiltern's sister. There had
been only two other guests, and both of them had been men on the
turf. "I was the first there," said Phineas, "and he surprised me
ever so much by telling me that you had spoken to him of me before."
"Yes; I did so. I wish him to know you. I want him to know some men
who think of something besides horses. He is very well educated, you
know, and would certainly have taken honours if he had not quarrelled
with the people at Christ Church."
"Did he take a degree?"
"No;--they sent him down. It is best always to have the truth among
friends. Of course you will hear it some day. They expelled him
because he was drunk." Then Lady Laura burst out into tears, and
Phineas sat near her, and consoled her, and swore that if in any way
he could befriend her brother he would do so.
Mr. Fitzgibbon at this time claimed a promise which he said that
Phineas had made to him,--that Phineas would go over with him to Mayo
to assist at his re-election. And Phineas did go. The whole affair
occupied but a week, and was chiefly memorable as being the means of
cementing the friendship which existed between the two Irish members.
"A thousand a year!" said Laurence Fitzgibbon, speaking of the salary
of his office. "It isn't much; is it? And every fellow to whom I owe
a shilling will be down upon me. If I had studied my own comfort, I
should have done the same as Kennedy."
CHAPTER X
Violet Effingham
It was now the middle of May, and a month had elapsed since the
terrible difficulty about the Queen's Government had been solved. A
month had elapsed, and things had shaken themselves into their places
with more of ease and apparent fitness than men had given them credit
for possessing. Mr. Mildmay, Mr. Gresham, and Mr. Monk were the best
friends in the world, swearing by each other in their own house, and
supported in the other by as gallant a phalanx of Whig peers as ever
were got together to fight against the instincts of their own order
in compliance with the instincts of those below them. Lady Laura's
father was in the Cabinet, to Lady Laura's infinite delight. It
was her ambition to be brought as near to political action as was
possible for a woman without surrendering any of the privileges of
feminine inaction. That women should even wish to have votes at
parliamentary elections was to her abominable, and the cause of the
Rights of Women generally was odious to her; but, nevertheless, for
herself, she delighted in hoping that she too might be useful,--in
thinking that she too was perhaps, in some degree, politically
powerful; and she had received considerable increase to such hopes
when her father accepted the Privy Seal. The Earl himself was not an
ambitious man, and, but for his daughter, would have severed himself
altogether from political life before this time. He was an unhappy
man;--being an obstinate man, and having in his obstinacy quarrelled
with his only son. In his unhappiness he would have kept himself
alone, living in the country, brooding over his wretchedness, were
it not for his daughter. On her behalf, and in obedience to her
requirements, he came yearly up to London, and, perhaps in compliance
with her persuasion, had taken some part in the debates of the House
of Lords. It is easy for a peer to be a statesman, if the trouble of
the life be not too much for him. Lord Brentford was now a statesman,
if a seat in the Cabinet be proof of statesmanship.
At this time, in May, there was staying with Lady Laura in Portman
Square a very dear friend of hers, by name Violet Effingham. Violet
Effingham was an orphan, an heiress, and a beauty; with a terrible
aunt, one Lady Baldock, who was supposed to be the dragon who had
Violet, as a captive maiden, in charge. But as Miss Effingham was of
age, and was mistress of her own fortune, Lady Baldock was, in truth,
not omnipotent as a dragon should be. The dragon, at any rate, was
not now staying in Portman Square, and the captivity of the maiden
was therefore not severe at the present moment. Violet Effingham was
very pretty, but could hardly be said to be beautiful. She was small,
with light crispy hair, which seemed to be ever on the flutter round
her brows, and which yet was never a hair astray. She had sweet, soft
grey eyes, which never looked at you long, hardly for a moment,--but
which yet, in that half moment, nearly killed you by the power of
their sweetness. Her cheek was the softest thing in nature, and the
colour of it, when its colour was fixed enough to be told, was a
shade of pink so faint and creamy that you would hardly dare to call
it by its name. Her mouth was perfect, not small enough to give that
expression of silliness which is so common, but almost divine, with
the temptation of its full, rich, ruby lips. Her teeth, which she but
seldom showed, were very even and very white, and there rested on her
chin the dearest dimple that ever acted as a loadstar to mens's eyes.
The fault of her face, if it had a fault, was in her nose,--which
was a little too sharp, and perhaps too small. A woman who wanted to
depreciate Violet Effingham had once called her a pug-nosed puppet;
but I, as her chronicler, deny that she was pug-nosed,--and all the
world who knew her soon came to understand that she was no puppet. In
figure she was small, but not so small as she looked to be. Her feet
and hands were delicately fine, and there was a softness about her
whole person, an apparent compressibility, which seemed to indicate
that she might go into very small compass. Into what compass and
how compressed, there were very many men who held very different
opinions. Violet Effingham was certainly no puppet. She was great
at dancing,--as perhaps might be a puppet,--but she was great also
at archery, great at skating,--and great, too, at hunting. With
reference to that last accomplishment, she and Lady Baldock had had
more than one terrible tussle, not always with advantage to the
dragon. "My dear aunt," she had said once during the last winter,
"I am going to the meet with George,"--George was her cousin, Lord
Baldock, and was the dragon's son,--"and there, let there be an end
of it." "And you will promise me that you will not go further," said
the dragon. "I will promise nothing to-day to any man or to any
woman," said Violet. What was to be said to a young lady who spoke in
this way, and who had become of age only a fortnight since? She rode
that day the famous run from Bagnall's Gorse to Foulsham Common, and
was in at the death.
Violet Effingham was now sitting in conference with her friend Lady
Laura, and they were discussing matters of high import,--of very high
import, indeed,--to the interests of both of them. "I do not ask you
to accept him," said Lady Laura.
"That is lucky," said the other, "as he has never asked me."
"He has done much the same. You know that he loves you."
"I know,--or fancy that I know,--that so many men love me! But, after
all, what sort of love is it? It is just as when you and I, when we
see something nice in a shop, call it a dear duck of a thing, and
tell somebody to go and buy it, let the price be ever so extravagant.
I know my own position, Laura. I'm a dear duck of a thing."
"You are a very dear thing to Oswald."
"But you, Laura, will some day inspire a grand passion,--or I daresay
have already, for you are a great deal too close to tell;--and then
there will be cutting of throats, and a mighty hubbub, and a real
tragedy. I shall never go beyond genteel comedy,--unless I run away
with somebody beneath me, or do something awfully improper."
"Don't do that, dear."
"I should like to, because of my aunt. I should indeed. If it were
possible, without compromising myself, I should like her to be told
some morning that I had gone off with the curate."
"How can you be so wicked, Violet!"
"It would serve her right, and her countenance would be so awfully
comic. Mind, if it is ever to come off, I must be there to see it. I
know what she would say as well as possible. She would turn to poor
Gussy. 'Augusta,' she would say, 'I always expected it. I always
did.' Then I should come out and curtsey to her, and say so prettily,
'Dear aunt, it was only our little joke.' That's my line. But for
you,--you, if you planned it, would go off to-morrow with Lucifer
himself if you liked him."
"But failing Lucifer, I shall probably be very humdrum."
"You don't mean that there is anything settled, Laura?"
"There is nothing settled,--or any beginning of anything that ever
can be settled, But I am not talking about myself. He has told me
that if you will accept him, he will do anything that you and I may
ask him."
"Yes;--he will promise."
"Did you ever know him to break his word?"
"I know nothing about him, my dear. How should I?"
"Do not pretend to be ignorant and meek, Violet. You do know
him,--much better than most girls know the men they marry. You have
known him, more or less intimately, all your life."
"But am I bound to marry him because of that accident?"
"No; you are not bound to marry him,--unless you love him."
"I do not love him," said Violet, with slow, emphatic words, and a
little forward motion of her face, as though she were specially eager
to convince her friend that she was quite in earnest in what she
said.
"I fancy, Violet, that you are nearer to loving him than any other
man."
"I am not at all near to loving any man. I doubt whether I ever shall
be. It does not seem to me to be possible to myself to be what girls
call in love. I can like a man. I do like, perhaps, half a dozen. I
like them so much that if I go to a house or to a party it is quite
a matter of importance to me whether this man or that will or will
not be there. And then I suppose I flirt with them. At least Augusta
tells me that my aunt says that I do. But as for caring about any one
of them in the way of loving him,--wanting to marry him, and have him
all to myself, and that sort of thing,--I don't know what it means."
"But you intend to be married some day," said Lady Laura.
"Certainly I do. And I don't intend to wait very much longer. I am
heartily tired of Lady Baldock, and though I can generally escape
among my friends, that is not sufficient. I am beginning to think
that it would be pleasant to have a house of my own. A girl becomes
such a Bohemian when she is always going about, and doesn't quite
know where any of her things are."
Then there was a silence between them for a few minutes. Violet
Effingham was doubled up in a corner of a sofa, with her feet tucked
under her, and her face reclining upon one of her shoulders. And as
she talked she was playing with a little toy which was constructed
to take various shapes as it was flung this way or that. A bystander
looking at her would have thought that the toy was much more to her
than the conversation. Lady Laura was sitting upright, in a common
chair, at a table not far from her companion, and was manifestly
devoting herself altogether to the subject that was being discussed
between them. She had taken no lounging, easy attitude, she had found
no employment for her fingers, and she looked steadily at Violet as
she talked,--whereas Violet was looking only at the little manikin
which she tossed. And now Laura got up and came to the sofa, and sat
close to her friend. Violet, though she somewhat moved one foot, so
as to seem to make room for the other, still went on with her play.
"If you do marry, Violet, you must choose some one man out of the
lot."
"That's quite true, my dear, I certainly can't marry them all."
"And how do you mean to make the choice?"
"I don't know. I suppose I shall toss up."
"I wish you would be in earnest with me."
"Well;--I will be in earnest. I shall take the first that comes after
I have quite made up my mind. You'll think it very horrible, but that
is really what I shall do. After all, a husband is very much like a
house or a horse. You don't take your house because it's the best
house in the world, but because just then you want a house. You go
and see a house, and if it's very nasty you don't take it. But if
you think it will suit pretty well, and if you are tired of looking
about for houses, you do take it. That's the way one buys one's
horses,--and one's husbands."
"And you have not made up your mind yet?"
"Not quite. Lady Baldock was a little more decent than usual just
before I left Baddingham. When I told her that I meant to have a pair
of ponies, she merely threw up her hands and grunted. She didn't
gnash her teeth, and curse and swear, and declare to me that I was a
child of perdition."
"What do you mean by cursing and swearing?"
"She told me once that if I bought a certain little dog, it would
lead to my being everlastingly--you know what. She isn't so squeamish
as I am, and said it out."
"What did you do?"
"I bought the little dog, and it bit my aunt's heel. I was very sorry
then, and gave the creature to Mary Rivers. He was such a beauty! I
hope the perdition has gone with him, for I don't like Mary Rivers
at all. I had to give the poor beasty to somebody, and Mary Rivers
happened to be there. I told her that Puck was connected with
Apollyon, but she didn't mind that. Puck was worth twenty guineas,
and I daresay she has sold him."
"Oswald may have an equal chance then among the other favourites?"
said Lady Laura, after another pause.
"There are no favourites, and I will not say that any man may have a
chance. Why do you press me about your brother in this way?"
"Because I am so anxious. Because it would save him. Because you are
the only woman for whom he has ever cared, and because he loves you
with all his heart; and because his father would be reconciled to him
to-morrow if he heard that you and he were engaged."
"Laura, my dear--"
"Well."
"You won't be angry if I speak out?"
"Certainly not. After what I have said, you have a right to speak
out."
"It seems to me that all your reasons are reasons why he should marry
me;--not reasons why I should marry him."
"Is not his love for you a reason?"
"No," said Violet, pausing,--and speaking the word in the lowest
possible whisper. "If he did not love me, that, if known to me,
should be a reason why I should not marry him. Ten men may love
me,--I don't say that any man does--"
"He does."
"But I can't marry all the ten. And as for that business of saving
him--"
"You know what I mean!"
"I don't know that I have any special mission for saving young men. I
sometimes think that I shall have quite enough to do to save myself.
It is strange what a propensity I feel for the wrong side of the
post."
"I feel the strongest assurance that you will always keep on the
right side."
"Thank you, my dear. I mean to try, but I'm quite sure that the
jockey who takes me in hand ought to be very steady himself. Now,
Lord Chiltern--"
"Well,--out with it. What have you to say?"
"He does not bear the best reputation in this world as a steady man.
Is he altogether the sort of man that mammas of the best kind are
seeking for their daughters? I like a roué myself;--and a prig who
sits all night in the House, and talks about nothing but church-rates
and suffrage, is to me intolerable. I prefer men who are improper,
and all that sort of thing. If I were a man myself I should go in for
everything I ought to leave alone. I know I should. But you see,--I'm
not a man, and I must take care of myself. The wrong side of a post
for a woman is so very much the wrong side. I like a fast man, but I
know that I must not dare to marry the sort of man that I like."
"To be one of us, then,--the very first among us;--would that be the
wrong side?"
"You mean that to be Lady Chiltern in the present tense, and Lady
Brentford in the future, would be promotion for Violet Effingham in
the past?"
"How hard you are, Violet!"
"Fancy,--that it should come to this,--that you should call me hard,
Laura. I should like to be your sister. I should like well enough to
be your father's daughter. I should like well enough to be Chiltern's
friend. I am his friend. Nothing that any one has ever said of him
has estranged me from him. I have fought for him till I have been
black in the face. Yes, I have,--with my aunt. But I am afraid to be
his wife. The risk would be so great. Suppose that I did not save
him, but that he brought me to shipwreck instead?"
"That could not be!"
"Could it not? I think it might be so very well. When I was a child
they used to be always telling me to mind myself. It seems to me that
a child and a man need not mind themselves. Let them do what they
may, they can be set right again. Let them fall as they will, you can
put them on their feet. But a woman has to mind herself;--and very
hard work it is when she has a dragon of her own driving her ever the
wrong way."
"I want to take you from the dragon."
"Yes;--and to hand me over to a griffin."
"The truth is, Violet, that you do not know Oswald. He is not a
griffin."
"I did not mean to be uncomplimentary. Take any of the dangerous
wild beasts you please. I merely intend to point out that he is a
dangerous wild beast. I daresay he is noble-minded, and I will call
him a lion if you like it better. But even with a lion there is
risk."
"Of course there will be risk. There is risk with every man,--unless
you will be contented with the prig you described. Of course there
would be risk with my brother. He has been a gambler."
"They say he is one still."
"He has given it up in part, and would entirely at your instance."
"And they say other things of him, Laura."
"It is true. He has had paroxysms of evil life which have well-nigh
ruined him."
"And these paroxysms are so dangerous! Is he not in debt?"
"He is,--but not deeply. Every shilling that he owes would be
paid;--every shilling. Mind, I know all his circumstances, and I
give you my word that every shilling should be paid. He has never
lied,--and he has told me everything. His father could not leave an
acre away from him if he would, and would not if he could."
"I did not ask as fearing that. I spoke only of a dangerous habit. A
paroxysm of spending money is apt to make one so uncomfortable. And
then--"
"Well."
"I don't know why I should make a catalogue of your brother's
weaknesses."
"You mean to say that he drinks too much?"
"I do not say so. People say so. The dragon says so. And as I always
find her sayings to be untrue, I suppose this is like the rest of
them."
"It is untrue if it be said of him as a habit."
"It is another paroxysm,--just now and then."
"Do not laugh at me, Violet, when I am taking his part, or I shall be
offended."
"But you see, if I am to be his wife, it is--rather important."
"Still you need not ridicule me."
"Dear Laura, you know I do not ridicule you. You know I love you for
what you are doing. Would not I do the same, and fight for him down
to my nails if I had a brother?"
"And therefore I want you to be Oswald's wife;--because I know that
you would fight for him. It is not true that he is a--drunkard. Look
at his hand, which is as steady as yours. Look at his eye. Is there a
sign of it? He has been drunk, once or twice, perhaps,--and has done
fearful things."
"It might be that he would do fearful things to me."
"You never knew a man with a softer heart or with a finer spirit. I
believe as I sit here that if he were married to-morrow, his vices
would fall from him like old clothes."
"You will admit, Laura, that there will be some risk for the wife."
"Of course there will be a risk. Is there not always a risk?"
"The men in the city would call this double-dangerous, I think," said
Violet. Then the door was opened, and the man of whom they were
speaking entered the room.
CHAPTER XI
Lord Chiltern
The reader has been told that Lord Chiltern was a red man, and that
peculiarity of his personal appearance was certainly the first to
strike a stranger. It imparted a certain look of ferocity to him,
which was apt to make men afraid of him at first sight. Women are not
actuated in the same way, and are accustomed to look deeper into men
at the first sight than other men will trouble themselves to do. His
beard was red, and was clipped, so as to have none of the softness of
waving hair. The hair on his head also was kept short, and was very
red,--and the colour of his face was red. Nevertheless he was a
handsome man, with well-cut features, not tall, but very strongly
built, and with a certain curl in the corner of his eyelids which
gave to him a look of resolution,--which perhaps he did not possess.
He was known to be a clever man, and when very young had had
the reputation of being a scholar. When he was three-and-twenty
grey-haired votaries of the turf declared that he would make his
fortune on the race-course,--so clear-headed was he as to odds, so
excellent a judge of a horse's performances, and so gifted with a
memory of events. When he was five-and-twenty he had lost every
shilling of a fortune of his own, had squeezed from his father more
than his father ever chose to name in speaking of his affairs to
any one, and was known to be in debt. But he had sacrificed himself
on one or two memorable occasions in conformity with turf laws of
honour, and men said of him, either that he was very honest or very
chivalric,--in accordance with the special views on the subject of
the man who was speaking. It was reported now that he no longer owned
horses on the turf;--but this was doubted by some who could name
the animals which they said that he owned, and which he ran in the
name of Mr. Macnab,--said some; of Mr. Pardoe,--said others; of Mr.
Chickerwick,--said a third set of informants. The fact was that Lord
Chiltern at this moment had no interest of his own in any horse upon
the turf.
But all the world knew that he drank. He had taken by the throat
a proctor's bull-dog when he had been drunk at Oxford, had nearly
strangled the man, and had been expelled. He had fallen through his
violence into some terrible misfortune at Paris, had been brought
before a public judge, and his name and his infamy had been made
notorious in every newspaper in the two capitals. After that he had
fought a ruffian at Newmarket, and had really killed him with his
fists. In reference to this latter affray it had been proved that the
attack had been made on him, that he had not been to blame, and that
he had not been drunk. After a prolonged investigation he had come
forth from that affair without disgrace. He would have done so, at
least, if he had not been heretofore disgraced. But we all know how
the man well spoken of may steal a horse, while he who is of evil
repute may not look over a hedge. It was asserted widely by many who
were supposed to know all about everything that Lord Chiltern was in
a fit of delirium tremens when he killed the ruffian at Newmarket.
The worst of that latter affair was that it produced the total
estrangement which now existed between Lord Brentford and his son.
Lord Brentford would not believe that his son was in that matter
more sinned against than sinning. "Such things do not happen to
other men's sons," he said, when Lady Laura pleaded for her brother.
Lady Laura could not induce her father to see his son, but so far
prevailed that no sentence of banishment was pronounced against
Lord Chiltern. There was nothing to prevent the son sitting at
his father's table if he so pleased. He never did so please,--but
nevertheless he continued to live in the house in Portman Square;
and when he met the Earl, in the hall, perhaps, or on the staircase,
would simply bow to him. Then the Earl would bow again, and shuffle
on,--and look very wretched, as no doubt he was. A grown-up son must
be the greatest comfort a man can have,--if he be his father's best
friend; but otherwise he can hardly be a comfort. As it was in this
house, the son was a constant thorn in his father's side.
"What does he do when we leave London?" Lord Brentford once said to
his daughter.
"He stays here, papa."
"But he hunts still?"
"Yes, he hunts,--and he has a room somewhere at an inn,--down in
Northamptonshire. But he is mostly in London. They have trains on
purpose."
"What a life for my son!" said the Earl. "What a life! Of course no
decent person will let him into his house." Lady Laura did not know
what to say to this, for in truth Lord Chiltern was not fond of
staying at the houses of persons whom the Earl would have called
decent.
General Effingham, the father of Violet, and Lord Brentford had been
the closest and dearest of friends. They had been young men in the
same regiment, and through life each had confided in the other. When
the General's only son, then a youth of seventeen, was killed in
one of our grand New Zealand wars, the bereaved father and the Earl
had been together for a month in their sorrow. At that time Lord
Chiltern's career had still been open to hope,--and the one man had
contrasted his lot with the other. General Effingham lived long
enough to hear the Earl declare that his lot was the happier of the
two. Now the General was dead, and Violet, the daughter of a second
wife, was all that was left of the Effinghams. This second wife had
been a Miss Plummer, a lady from the city with much money, whose
sister had married Lord Baldock. Violet in this way had fallen to the
care of the Baldock people, and not into the hands of her father's
friends. But, as the reader will have surmised, she had ideas of her
own of emancipating herself from Baldock thraldom.
Twice before that last terrible affair at Newmarket, before the
quarrel between the father and the son had been complete, Lord
Brentford had said a word to his daughter,--merely a word,--of his
son in connection with Miss Effingham.
"If he thinks of it I shall be glad to see him on the subject. You
may tell him so." That had been the first word. He had just then
resolved that the affair in Paris should be regarded as condoned,--as
among the things to be forgotten. "She is too good for him; but if he
asks her let him tell her everything." That had been the second word,
and had been spoken immediately subsequent to a payment of twelve
thousand pounds made by the Earl towards the settlement of certain
Doncaster accounts. Lady Laura in negotiating for the money had
been very eloquent in describing some honest,--or shall we say
chivalric,--sacrifice which had brought her brother into this special
difficulty. Since that the Earl had declined to interest himself in
his son's matrimonial affairs; and when Lady Laura had once again
mentioned the matter, declaring her belief that it would be the means
of saving her brother Oswald, the Earl had desired her to be silent.
"Would you wish to destroy the poor child?" he had said. Nevertheless
Lady Laura felt sure that if she were to go to her father with a
positive statement that Oswald and Violet were engaged, he would
relent and would accept Violet as his daughter. As for the payment of
Lord Chiltern's present debts;--she had a little scheme of her own
about that.
Miss Effingham, who had been already two days in Portman Square, had
not as yet seen Lord Chiltern. She knew that he lived in the house,
that is, that he slept there, and probably eat his breakfast in some
apartment of his own;--but she knew also that the habits of the house
would not by any means make it necessary that they should meet. Laura
and her brother probably saw each other daily,--but they never went
into society together, and did not know the same sets of people.
When she had announced to Lady Baldock her intention of spending the
first fortnight of her London season with her friend Lady Laura,
Lady Baldock had as a matter of course--"jumped upon her," as Miss
Effingham would herself call it.
"You are going to the house of the worst reprobate in all England,"
said Lady Baldock.
"What;--dear old Lord Brentford, whom papa loved so well!"
"I mean Lord Chiltern, who, only last year,--murdered a man!"
"That is not true, aunt."
"There is worse than that,--much worse. He is always--tipsy, and
always gambling, and always-- But it is quite unfit that I should
speak a word more to you about such a man as Lord Chiltern. His name
ought never to be mentioned."
"Then why did you mention it, aunt?"
Lady Baldock's process of jumping upon her niece,--in which I think
the aunt had generally the worst of the exercise,--went on for some
time, but Violet of course carried her point.
"If she marries him there will be an end of everything," said Lady
Baldock to her daughter Augusta.
"She has more sense than that, mamma," said Augusta.
"I don't think she has any sense at all," said Lady Baldock;--"not in
the least. I do wish my poor sister had lived;--I do indeed."
Lord Chiltern was now in the room with Violet,--immediately upon that
conversation between Violet and his sister as to the expediency of
Violet becoming his wife. Indeed his entrance had interrupted the
conversation before it was over. "I am so glad to see you, Miss
Effingham," he said. "I came in thinking that I might find you."
"Here I am, as large as life," she said, getting up from her
corner on the sofa and giving him her hand. "Laura and I have been
discussing the affairs of the nation for the last two days, and have
nearly brought our discussion to an end." She could not help looking,
first at his eye and then at his hand, not as wanting evidence to
the truth of the statement which his sister had made, but because
the idea of a drunkard's eye and a drunkard's hand had been brought
before her mind. Lord Chiltern's hand was like the hand of any other
man, but there was something in his eye that almost frightened her.
It looked as though he would not hesitate to wring his wife's neck
round, if ever he should be brought to threaten to do so. And then
his eye, like the rest of him, was red. No;--she did not think that
she could ever bring herself to marry him. Why take a venture that
was double-dangerous, when there were so many ventures open to her,
apparently with very little of danger attached to them? "If it should
ever be said that I loved him, I would do it all the same," she said
to herself.
"If I did not come and see you here, I suppose that I should never
see you," said he, seating himself. "I do not often go to parties,
and when I do you are not likely to be there."
"We might make our little arrangements for meeting," said she,
laughing. "My aunt, Lady Baldock, is going to have an evening next
week."
"The servants would be ordered to put me out of the house."
"Oh no. You can tell her that I invited you."
"I don't think that Oswald and Lady Baldock are great friends," said
Lady Laura.
"Or he might come and take you and me to the Zoo on Sunday. That's
the proper sort of thing for a brother and a friend to do."
"I hate that place in the Regent's Park," said Lord Chiltern.
"When were you there last?" demanded Miss Effingham.
"When I came home once from Eton. But I won't go again till I can
come home from Eton again." Then he altered his tone as he continued
to speak. "People would look at me as if I were the wildest beast in
the whole collection."
"Then," said Violet, "if you won't go to Lady Baldock's or to the
Zoo, we must confine ourselves to Laura's drawing-room;--unless,
indeed, you like to take me to the top of the Monument."
"I'll take you to the top of the Monument with pleasure."
"What do you say, Laura?"
"I say that you are a foolish girl," said Lady Laura, "and that I
will have nothing to do with such a scheme."
"Then there is nothing for it but that you should come here; and as
you live in the house, and as I am sure to be here every morning,
and as you have no possible occupation for your time, and as we have
nothing particular to do with ours,--I daresay I shan't see you again
before I go to my aunt's in Berkeley Square."
"Very likely not," he said.
"And why not, Oswald?" asked his sister.
He passed his hand over his face before he answered her. "Because she
and I run in different grooves now, and are not such meet playfellows
as we used to be once. Do you remember my taking you away right
through Saulsby Wood once on the old pony, and not bringing you back
till tea-time, and Miss Blink going and telling my father?"
"Do I remember it? I think it was the happiest day in my life. His
pockets were crammed full of gingerbread and Everton toffy, and we
had three bottles of lemonade slung on to the pony's saddlebows. I
thought it was a pity that we should ever come back."
"It was a pity," said Lord Chiltern.
"But, nevertheless, substantially necessary," said Lady Laura.
"Failing our power of reproducing the toffy, I suppose it was," said
Violet.
"You were not Miss Effingham then," said Lord Chiltern.
"No,--not as yet. These disagreeable realities of life grow upon
one; do they not? You took off my shoes and dried them for me at a
woodman's cottage. I am obliged to put up with my maid's doing those
things now. And Miss Blink the mild is changed for Lady Baldock the
martinet. And if I rode about with you in a wood all day I should
be sent to Coventry instead of to bed. And so you see everything is
changed as well as my name."
"Everything is not changed," said Lord Chiltern, getting up from
his seat. "I am not changed,--at least not in this, that as I loved
you better than any being in the world,--better even than Laura
there,--so do I love you now infinitely the best of all. Do not look
so surprised at me. You knew it before as well as you do now;--and
Laura knows it. There is no secret to be kept in the matter among us
three."
"But, Lord Chiltern,--" said Miss Effingham, rising also to her feet,
and then pausing, not knowing how to answer him. There had been a
suddenness in his mode of addressing her which had, so to say, almost
taken away her breath; and then to be told by a man of his love
before his sister was in itself, to her, a matter so surprising, that
none of those words came at her command which will come, as though by
instinct, to young ladies on such occasions.
"You have known it always," said he, as though he were angry with
her.
"Lord Chiltern," she replied, "you must excuse me if I say that you
are, at the least, very abrupt. I did not think when I was going back
so joyfully to our childish days that you would turn the tables on me
in this way."
"He has said nothing that ought to make you angry," said Lady Laura.
"Only because he has driven me to say that which will make me appear
to be uncivil to himself. Lord Chiltern, I do not love you with that
love of which you are speaking now. As an old friend I have always
regarded you, and I hope that I may always do so." Then she got up
and left the room.
"Why were you so sudden with her,--so abrupt,--so loud?" said his
sister, coming up to him and taking him by the arm almost in anger.
"It would make no difference," said he. "She does not care for me."
"It makes all the difference in the world," said Lady Laura. "Such
a woman as Violet cannot be had after that fashion. You must begin
again."
"I have begun and ended," he said.
"That is nonsense. Of course you will persist. It was madness to
speak in that way to-day. You may be sure of this, however, that
there is no one she likes better than you. You must remember that you
have done much to make any girl afraid of you."
"I do remember it."
"Do something now to make her fear you no longer. Speak to her
softly. Tell her of the sort of life which you would live with her.
Tell her that all is changed. As she comes to love you, she will
believe you when she would believe no one else on that matter."
"Am I to tell her a lie?" said Lord Chiltern, looking his sister full
in the face. Then he turned upon his heel and left her.
CHAPTER XII
Autumnal Prospects
The session went on very calmly after the opening battle which ousted
Lord de Terrier and sent Mr. Mildmay back to the Treasury,--so calmly
that Phineas Finn was unconsciously disappointed, as lacking that
excitement of contest to which he had been introduced in the first
days of his parliamentary career. From time to time certain waspish
attacks were made by Mr. Daubeny, now on this Secretary of State and
now on that; but they were felt by both parties to mean nothing; and
as no great measure was brought forward, nothing which would serve
by the magnitude of its interests to divide the liberal side of the
House into fractions, Mr. Mildmay's Cabinet was allowed to hold its
own in comparative peace and quiet. It was now July,--the middle of
July,--and the member for Loughshane had not yet addressed the House.
How often had he meditated doing so; how he had composed his speeches
walking round the Park on his way down to the House; how he got his
subjects up,--only to find on hearing them discussed that he really
knew little or nothing about them; how he had his arguments and
almost his very words taken out of his mouth by some other member;
and lastly, how he had actually been deterred from getting upon his
legs by a certain tremor of blood round his heart when the moment
for rising had come,--of all this he never said a word to any man.
Since that last journey to county Mayo, Laurence Fitzgibbon had been
his most intimate friend, but he said nothing of all this even to
Laurence Fitzgibbon. To his other friend, Lady Laura Standish, he did
explain something of his feelings, not absolutely describing to her
the extent of hindrance to which his modesty had subjected him, but
letting her know that he had his qualms as well as his aspirations.
But as Lady Laura always recommended patience, and more than once
expressed her opinion that a young member would be better to sit
in silence at least for one session, he was not driven to the
mortification of feeling that he was incurring her contempt by his
bashfulness. As regarded the men among whom he lived, I think he was
almost annoyed at finding that no one seemed to expect that he should
speak. Barrington Erle, when he had first talked of sending Phineas
down to Loughshane, had predicted for him all manner of parliamentary
successes, and had expressed the warmest admiration of the manner in
which Phineas had discussed this or that subject at the Union. "We
have not above one or two men in the House who can do that kind of
thing," Barrington Erle had once said. But now no allusions whatever
were made to his powers of speech, and Phineas in his modest moments
began to be more amazed than ever that he should find himself seated
in that chamber.
To the forms and technicalities of parliamentary business he did give
close attention, and was unremitting in his attendance. On one or two
occasions he ventured to ask a question of the Speaker, and as the
words of experience fell into his ears, he would tell himself that
he was going through his education,--that he was learning to be a
working member, and perhaps to be a statesman. But his regrets with
reference to Mr. Low and the dingy chambers in Old Square were very
frequent; and had it been possible for him to undo all that he had
done, he would often have abandoned to some one else the honour of
representing the electors of Loughshane.
But he was supported in all his difficulties by the kindness of his
friend, Lady Laura Standish. He was often in the house in Portman
Square, and was always received with cordiality, and, as he thought,
almost with affection. She would sit and talk to him, sometimes
saying a word about her brother and sometimes about her father, as
though there were more between them than the casual intimacy of
London acquaintance. And in Portman Square he had been introduced to
Miss Effingham, and had found Miss Effingham to be--very nice. Miss
Effingham had quite taken to him, and he had danced with her at two
or three parties, talking always, as he did so, about Lady Laura
Standish.
"I declare, Laura, I think your friend Mr. Finn is in love with you,"
said Violet to Lady Laura one night.
"I don't think that. He is fond of me, and so am I of him. He is
so honest, and so naïve without being awkward! And then he is
undoubtedly clever."
"And so uncommonly handsome," said Violet.
"I don't know that that makes much difference," said Lady Laura.
"I think it does if a man looks like a gentleman as well."
"Mr. Finn certainly looks like a gentleman," said Lady Laura.
"And no doubt is one," said Violet. "I wonder whether he has got any
money."
"Not a penny, I should say."
"How does such a man manage to live? There are so many men like that,
and they are always mysteries to me. I suppose he'll have to marry an
heiress."
"Whoever gets him will not have a bad husband," said Lady Laura
Standish.
Phineas during the summer had very often met Mr. Kennedy. They sat
on the same side of the House, they belonged to the same club, they
dined together more than once in Portman Square, and on one occasion
Phineas had accepted an invitation to dinner sent to him by Mr.
Kennedy himself. "A slower affair I never saw in my life," he said
afterwards to Laurence Fitzgibbon. "Though there were two or three
men there who talk everywhere else, they could not talk at his
table." "He gave you good wine, I should say," said Fitzgibbon, "and
let me tell you that that covers a multitude of sins." In spite,
however, of all these opportunities for intimacy, now, nearly at
the end of the session, Phineas had hardly spoken a dozen words to
Mr. Kennedy, and really knew nothing whatsoever of the man, as one
friend,--or even as one acquaintance knows another. Lady Laura had
desired him to be on good terms with Mr. Kennedy, and for that reason
he had dined with him. Nevertheless he disliked Mr. Kennedy, and felt
quite sure that Mr. Kennedy disliked him. He was therefore rather
surprised when he received the following note:--
Albany, Z 3, July 17, 186--.
MY DEAR MR. FINN,
I shall have some friends at Loughlinter next month, and
should be very glad if you will join us. I will name the
16th August. I don't know whether you shoot, but there are
grouse and deer.
Yours truly,
ROBERT KENNEDY.
What was he to do? He had already begun to feel rather uncomfortable
at the prospect of being separated from all his new friends as soon
as the session should be over. Laurence Fitzgibhon had asked him to
make another visit to county Mayo, but that he had declined. Lady
Laura had said something to him about going abroad with her brother,
and since that there had sprung up a sort of intimacy between him and
Lord Chiltern; but nothing had been fixed about this foreign trip,
and there were pecuniary objections to it which put it almost out of
his power. The Christmas holidays he would of course pass with his
family at Killaloe, but he hardly liked the idea of hurrying off to
Killaloe immediately the session should be over. Everybody around
him seemed to be looking forward to pleasant leisure doings in the
country. Men talked about grouse, and of the ladies at the houses to
which they were going and of the people whom they were to meet. Lady
Laura had said nothing of her own movements for the early autumn, and
no invitation had come to him to go to the Earl's country house. He
had already felt that every one would depart and that he would be
left,--and this had made him uncomfortable. What was he to do with
the invitation from Mr. Kennedy? He disliked the man, and had told
himself half a dozen times that he despised him. Of course he must
refuse it. Even for the sake of the scenery, and the grouse, and the
pleasant party, and the feeling that going to Loughlinter in August
would be the proper sort of thing to do, he must refuse it! But it
occurred to him at last that he would call in Portman Square before
he wrote his note.
"Of course you will go," said Lady Laura, in her most decided tone.
"And why?"
"In the first place it is civil in him to ask you, and why should you
be uncivil in return?"
"There is nothing uncivil in not accepting a man's invitation," said
Phineas.
"We are going," said Lady Laura, "and I can only say that I shall be
disappointed if you do not go too. Both Mr. Gresham and Mr. Monk will
be there, and I believe they have never stayed together in the same
house before. I have no doubt there are a dozen men on your side of
the House who would give their eyes to be there. Of course you will
go."
Of course he did go. The note accepting Mr. Kennedy's invitation was
written at the Reform Club within a quarter of an hour of his leaving
Portman Square. He was very careful in writing to be not more
familiar or more civil than Mr. Kennedy had been to himself, and
then he signed himself "Yours truly, Phineas Finn." But another
proposition was made to him, and a most charming proposition, during
the few minutes that he remained in Portman Square. "I am so glad,"
said Lady Laura, "because I can now ask you to run down to us at
Saulsby for a couple of days on your way to Loughlinter. Till this
was fixed I couldn't ask you to come all the way to Saulsby for two
days; and there won't be room for more between our leaving London
and starting to Loughlinter." Phineas swore that he would have gone
if it had been but for one hour, and if Saulsby had been twice the
distance. "Very well; come on the 13th and go on the 15th. You must
go on the 15th, unless you choose to stay with the housekeeper.
And remember, Mr. Finn, we have got no grouse at Saulsby." Phineas
declared that he did not care a straw for grouse.
There was another little occurrence which happened before Phineas
left London, and which was not altogether so charming as his
prospects at Saulsby and Loughlinter. Early in August, when the
session was still incomplete, he dined with Laurence Fitzgibbon at
the Reform Club. Laurence had specially invited him to do so, and
made very much of him on the occasion. "By George, my dear fellow,"
Laurence said to him that morning, "nothing has happened to me this
session that has given me so much pleasure as your being in the
House. Of course there are fellows with whom one is very intimate and
of whom one is very fond,--and all that sort of thing. But most of
these Englishmen on our side are such cold fellows; or else they are
like Ratler and Barrington Erle, thinking of nothing but politics.
And then as to our own men, there are so many of them one can hardly
trust! That's the truth of it. Your being in the House has been such
a comfort to me!" Phineas, who really liked his friend Laurence,
expressed himself very warmly in answer to this, and became
affectionate, and made sundry protestations of friendship which were
perfectly sincere. Their sincerity was tested after dinner, when
Fitzgibbon, as they two were seated on a sofa in the corner of the
smoking-room, asked Phineas to put his name to the back of a bill for
two hundred and fifty pounds at six months' date.
"But, my dear Laurence," said Phineas, "two hundred and fifty pounds
is a sum of money utterly beyond my reach."
"Exactly, my dear boy, and that's why I've come to you. D'ye think
I'd have asked anybody who by any impossibility might have been made
to pay anything for me?"
"But what's the use of it then?"
"All the use in the world. It's for me to judge of the use, you know.
Why, d'ye think I'd ask it if it wasn't any use? I'll make it of use,
my boy. And take my word, you'll never hear about it again. It's just
a forestalling of my salary; that's all. I wouldn't do it till I saw
that we were at least safe for six months to come." Then Phineas Finn
with many misgivings, with much inward hatred of himself for his own
weakness, did put his name on the back of the bill which Laurence
Fitzgibbon had prepared for his signature.
CHAPTER XIII
Saulsby Wood
"So you won't come to Moydrum again?" said Laurence Fitzgibbon to his
friend.
"Not this autumn, Laurence. Your father would think that I want to
live there."
"Bedad, it's my father would be glad to see you,--and the oftener the
better."
"The fact is, my time is filled up."
"You're not going to be one of the party at Loughlinter?"
"I believe I am. Kennedy asked me, and people seem to think that
everybody is to do what he bids them."
"I should think so too. I wish he had asked me. I should have thought
it as good as a promise of an under-secretaryship. All the Cabinet
are to be there. I don't suppose he ever had an Irishman in his house
before. When do you start?"
"Well;--on the 12th or 13th. I believe I shall go to Saulsby on my
way."
"The devil you will. Upon my word, Phineas, my boy, you're the
luckiest fellow I know. This is your first year, and you're asked to
the two most difficult houses in England. You have only to look out
for an heiress now. There is little Vi Effingham;--she is sure to be
at Saulsby. Good-bye, old fellow. Don't you be in the least unhappy
about the bill. I'll see to making that all right."
Phineas was rather unhappy about the bill; but there was so much that
was pleasant in his cup at the present moment, that he resolved, as
far as possible, to ignore the bitter of that one ingredient. He was
a little in the dark as to two or three matters respecting these
coming visits. He would have liked to have taken a servant with him;
but he had no servant, and felt ashamed to hire one for the occasion.
And then he was in trouble about a gun, and the paraphernalia of
shooting. He was not a bad shot at snipe in the bogs of county Clare,
but he had never even seen a gun used in England. However, he bought
himself a gun,--with other paraphernalia, and took a license for
himself, and then groaned over the expense to which he found that his
journey would subject him. And at last he hired a servant for the
occasion. He was intensely ashamed of himself when he had done so,
hating himself, and telling himself that he was going to the devil
headlong. And why had he done it? Not that Lady Laura would like him
the better, or that she would care whether he had a servant or not.
She probably would know nothing of his servant. But the people about
her would know, and he was foolishly anxious that the people about
her should think that he was worthy of her.
Then he called on Mr. Low before he started. "I did not like to leave
London without seeing you," he said; "but I know you will have
nothing pleasant to say to me."
"I shall say nothing unpleasant certainly. I see your name in the
divisions, and I feel a sort of envy myself."
"Any fool could go into a lobby," said Phineas.
"To tell you the truth, I have been gratified to see that you have
had the patience to abstain from speaking till you had looked about
you. It was more than I expected from your hot Irish blood. Going
to meet Mr. Gresham and Mr. Monk,--are you? Well, I hope you may
meet them in the Cabinet some day. Mind you come and see me when
Parliament meets in February."
Mrs. Bunce was delighted when she found that Phineas had hired a
servant; but Mr. Bunce predicted nothing but evil from so vain an
expense. "Don't tell me; where is it to come from? He ain't no
richer because he's in Parliament. There ain't no wages. M.P. and
M.T.,"--whereby Mr. Bunce, I fear, meant empty,--"are pretty much
alike when a man hasn't a fortune at his back." "But he's going to
stay with all the lords in the Cabinet," said Mrs. Bunce, to whom
Phineas, in his pride, had confided perhaps more than was necessary.
"Cabinet, indeed," said Bunce; "if he'd stick to chambers, and let
alone cabinets, he'd do a deal better. Given up his rooms, has
he,--till February? He don't expect we're going to keep them empty
for him!"
Phineas found that the house was full at Saulsby, although the
sojourn of the visitors would necessarily be so short. There
were three or four there on their way on to Loughlinter, like
himself,--Mr. Bonteen and Mr. Ratler, with Mr. Palliser, the
Chancellor of the Exchequer, and his wife,--and there was Violet
Effingham, who, however, was not going to Loughlinter. "No, indeed,"
she said to our hero, who on the first evening had the pleasure
of taking her in to dinner, "unfortunately I haven't a seat in
Parliament, and therefore I am not asked."
"Lady Laura is going."
"Yes;--but Lady Laura has a Cabinet Minister in her keeping. I've
only one comfort;--you'll be awfully dull."
"I daresay it would be very much nicer to stay here," said Phineas.
"If you want to know my real mind," said Violet, "I would give one of
my little fingers to go. There will be four Cabinet Ministers in the
house, and four un-Cabinet Ministers, and half a dozen other members
of Parliament, and there will be Lady Glencora Palliser, who is the
best fun in the world; and, in point of fact, it's the thing of the
year. But I am not asked. You see I belong to the Baldock faction,
and we don't sit on your side of the House. Mr. Kennedy thinks that I
should tell secrets."
Why on earth had Mr. Kennedy invited him, Phineas Finn, to meet four
Cabinet Ministers and Lady Glencora Palliser? He could only have done
so at the instance of Lady Laura Standish. It was delightful for
Phineas to think that Lady Laura cared for him so deeply; but it was
not equally delightful when he remembered how very close must be
the alliance between Mr. Kennedy and Lady Laura, when she was thus
powerful with him.
At Saulsby Phineas did not see much of his hostess. When they were
making their plans for the one entire day of this visit, she said a
soft word of apology to him. "I am so busy with all these people,
that I hardly know what I am doing. But we shall be able to find a
quiet minute or two at Loughlinter,--unless, indeed, you intend to
be on the mountains all day. I suppose you have brought a gun like
everybody else?"
"Yes;--I have brought a gun. I do shoot; but I am not an inveterate
sportsman."
On that one day there was a great riding party made up, and Phineas
found himself mounted, after luncheon, with some dozen other
equestrians. Among them were Miss Effingham and Lady Glencora, Mr.
Ratler and the Earl of Brentford himself. Lady Glencora, whose
husband was, as has been said, Chancellor of the Exchequer, and who
was still a young woman, and a very pretty woman, had taken lately
very strongly to politics, which she discussed among men and women
of both parties with something more than ordinary audacity. "What a
nice, happy, lazy time you've had of it since you've been in," said
she to the Earl.
"I hope we have been more happy than lazy," said the Earl.
"But you've done nothing. Mr. Palliser has twenty schemes of reform,
all mature; but among you you've not let him bring in one of them.
The Duke and Mr. Mildmay and you will break his heart among you."
"Poor Mr. Palliser!"
"The truth is, if you don't take care he and Mr. Monk and Mr. Gresham
will arise and shake themselves, and turn you all out."
"We must look to ourselves, Lady Glencora."
"Indeed, yes;--or you will be known to all posterity as the fainéant
government."
"Let me tell you, Lady Glencora, that a fainéant government is not
the worst government that England can have. It has been the great
fault of our politicians that they have all wanted to do something."
"Mr. Mildmay is at any rate innocent of that charge," said Lady
Glencora.
They were now riding through a vast wood, and Phineas found himself
delightfully established by the side of Violet Effingham. "Mr. Ratler
has been explaining to me that he must have nineteen next session.
Now, if I were you, Mr. Finn, I would decline to be counted up in
that way as one of Mr. Ratler's sheep."
"But what am I to do?"
"Do something on your own hook. You men in Parliament are so much
like sheep! If one jumps at a gap, all go after him,--and then you
are penned into lobbies, and then you are fed, and then you are
fleeced. I wish I were in Parliament. I'd get up in the middle and
make such a speech. You all seem to me to be so much afraid of one
another that you don't quite dare to speak out. Do you see that
cottage there?"
"What a pretty cottage it is!"
"Yes;--is it not? Twelve years ago I took off my shoes and stockings
and had them dried in that cottage, and when I got back to the house
I was put to bed for having been out all day in the wood."
"Were you wandering about alone?"
"No, I wasn't alone. Oswald Standish was with me. We were children
then. Do you know him?"
"Lord Chiltern;--yes, I know him. He and I have been rather friends
this year."
"He is very good;--is he not?"
"Good,--in what way?"
"Honest and generous!"
"I know no man whom I believe to be more so."
"And he is clever?" asked Miss Effingham.
"Very clever. That is, he talks very well if you will let him talk
after his own fashion. You would always fancy that he was going to
eat you;--but that is his way."
"And you like him?"
"Very much."
"I am so glad to hear you say so."
"Is he a favourite of yours, Miss Effingham?"
"Not now,--not particularly. I hardly ever see him. But his sister is
the best friend I have, and I used to like him so much when he was a
boy! I have not seen that cottage since that day, and I remember it
as though it were yesterday. Lord Chiltern is quite changed, is he
not?"
"Changed,--in what way?"
"They used to say that he was--unsteady you know."
"I think he is changed. But Chiltern is at heart a Bohemian. It is
impossible not to see that at once. He hates the decencies of life."
"I suppose he does," said Violet. "He ought to marry. If he were
married, that would all be cured;--don't you think so?"
"I cannot fancy him with a wife," said Phineas, "There is a savagery
about him which would make him an uncomfortable companion for a
woman."
"But he would love his wife?"
"Yes, as he does his horses. And he would treat her well,--as he does
his horses. But he expects every horse he has to do anything that any
horse can do; and he would expect the same of his wife."
Phineas had no idea how deep an injury he might be doing his friend
by this description, nor did it once occur to him that his companion
was thinking of herself as the possible wife of this Red Indian. Miss
Effingham rode on in silence for some distance, and then she said
but one word more about Lord Chiltern. "He was so good to me in that
cottage."
On the following day the party at Saulsby was broken up, and there
was a regular pilgrimage towards Loughlinter. Phineas resolved upon
sleeping a night at Edinburgh on his way, and he found himself joined
in the bands of close companionship with Mr. Ratler for the occasion.
The evening was by no means thrown away, for he learned much of his
trade from Mr. Ratler. And Mr. Ratler was heard to declare afterwards
at Loughlinter that Mr. Finn was a pleasant young man.
It soon came to be admitted by all who knew Phineas Finn that he had
a peculiar power of making himself agreeable which no one knew how to
analyse or define. "I think it is because he listens so well," said
one man. "But the women would not like him for that," said another.
"He has studied when to listen and when to talk," said a third. The
truth, however, was, that Phineas Finn had made no study in the
matter at all. It was simply his nature to be pleasant.
CHAPTER XIV
Loughlinter
Phineas Finn reached Loughlinter together with Mr. Ratler in a
post-chaise from the neighbouring town. Mr. Ratler, who had done this
kind of thing very often before, travelled without impediments, but
the new servant of our hero's was stuck outside with the driver, and
was in the way. "I never bring a man with me," said Mr. Ratler to his
young friend. "The servants of the house like it much better, because
they get fee'd; you are just as well waited on, and it don't cost
half as much." Phineas blushed as he heard all this; but there was
the impediment, not to be got rid of for the nonce, and Phineas made
the best of his attendant. "It's one of those points," said he, "as
to which a man never quite makes up his mind. If you bring a fellow,
you wish you hadn't brought him; and if you don't, you wish you had."
"I'm a great deal more decided in my ways that that," said Mr.
Ratler.
Loughlinter, as they approached it, seemed to Phineas to be a much
finer place than Saulsby. And so it was, except that Loughlinter
wanted that graceful beauty of age which Saulsby possessed.
Loughlinter was all of cut stone, but the stones had been cut only
yesterday. It stood on a gentle slope, with a greensward falling from
the front entrance down to a mountain lake. And on the other side of
the Lough there rose a mighty mountain to the skies, Ben Linter. At
the foot of it, and all round to the left, there ran the woods of
Linter, stretching for miles through crags and bogs and mountain
lands. No better ground for deer than the side of Ben Linter was
there in all those highlands. And the Linter, rushing down into the
Lough through rocks which, in some places, almost met together above
its waters, ran so near to the house that the pleasant noise of its
cataracts could be heard from the hall door. Behind the house the
expanse of drained park land seemed to be interminable; and then,
again, came the mountains. There were Ben Linn and Ben Lody;--and
the whole territory belonging to Mr. Kennedy. He was laird of Linn
and laird of Linter, as his people used to say. And yet his father
had walked into Glasgow as a little boy,--no doubt with the normal
half-crown in his breeches pocket.
"Magnificent;--is it not?" said Phineas to the Treasury Secretary,
as they were being driven up to the door.
"Very grand;--but the young trees show the new man. A new man may buy
a forest; but he can't get park trees."
Phineas, at the moment, was thinking how far all these things which
he saw, the mountains stretching everywhere around him, the castle,
the lake, the river, the wealth of it all, and, more than the wealth,
the nobility of the beauty, might act as temptations to Lady Laura
Standish. If a woman were asked to have the half of all this, would
it be possible that she should prefer to take the half of his
nothing? He thought it might be possible for a girl who would
confess, or seem to confess, that love should be everything. But it
could hardly be possible for a woman who looked at the world almost
as a man looked at it,--as an oyster to be opened with such weapon
as she could find ready to her hand. Lady Laura professed to have a
care for all the affairs of the world. She loved politics, and could
talk of social science, and had broad ideas about religion, and was
devoted to certain educational views. Such a woman would feel that
wealth was necessary to her, and would be willing, for the sake of
wealth, to put up with a husband without romance. Nay; might it not
be that she would prefer a husband without romance? Thus Phineas was
arguing to himself as he was driven up to the door of Loughlinter
Castle, while Mr. Ratler was eloquent on the beauty of old park
trees. "After all, a Scotch forest is a very scrubby sort of thing,"
said Mr. Ratler.
There was nobody in the house,--at least, they found nobody; and
within half an hour Phineas was walking about the grounds by himself.
Mr. Ratler had declared himself to be delighted at having an
opportunity of writing letters,--and no doubt was writing them by
the dozen, all dated from Loughlinter, and all detailing the facts
that Mr. Gresham, and Mr. Monk, and Plantagenet Palliser, and Lord
Brentford were in the same house with him. Phineas had no letters to
write, and therefore rushed down across the broad lawn to the river,
of which he heard the noisy tumbling waters. There was something in
the air which immediately filled him with high spirits; and, in his
desire to investigate the glories of the place, he forgot that he was
going to dine with four Cabinet Ministers in a row. He soon reached
the stream, and began to make his way up it through the ravine. There
was waterfall over waterfall, and there were little bridges here and
there which looked to be half natural and half artificial, and a path
which required that you should climb, but which was yet a path, and
all was so arranged that not a pleasant splashing rush of the waters
was lost to the visitor. He went on and on, up the stream, till there
was a sharp turn in the ravine, and then, looking upwards, he saw
above his head a man and a woman standing together on one of the
little half-made wooden bridges. His eyes were sharp, and he saw at a
glance that the woman was Lady Laura Standish. He had not recognised
the man, but he had very little doubt that it was Mr. Kennedy. Of
course it was Mr. Kennedy, because he would prefer that it should be
any other man under the sun. He would have turned back at once if he
had thought that he could have done so without being observed; but he
felt sure that, standing as they were, they must have observed him.
He did not like to join them. He would not intrude himself. So he
remained still, and began to throw stones into the river. But he had
not thrown above a stone or two when he was called from above. He
looked up, and then he perceived that the man who called him was his
host. Of course it was Mr. Kennedy. Thereupon he ceased to throw
stones, and went up the path, and joined them upon the bridge. Mr.
Kennedy stepped forward, and bade him welcome to Loughlinter. His
manner was less cold, and he seemed to have more words at command
than was usual with him. "You have not been long," he said, "in
finding out the most beautiful spot about the place."
"Is it not lovely?" said Laura. "We have not been here an hour yet,
and Mr. Kennedy insisted on bringing me here."
"It is wonderfully beautiful," said Phineas.
"It is this very spot where we now stand that made me build the house
where it is," said Mr. Kennedy, "and I was only eighteen when I stood
here and made up my mind. That is just twenty-five years ago." "So he
is forty-three," said Phineas to himself, thinking how glorious it
was to be only twenty-five. "And within twelve months," continued Mr.
Kennedy, "the foundations were being dug and the stone-cutters were
at work."
"What a good-natured man your father must have been," said Lady
Laura.
"He had nothing else to do with his money but to pour it over my
head, as it were. I don't think he had any other enjoyment of it
himself. Will you go a little higher, Lady Laura? We shall get a fine
view over to Ben Linn just now." Lady Laura declared that she would
go as much higher as he chose to take her, and Phineas was rather in
doubt as to what it would become him to do. He would stay where he
was, or go down, or make himself to vanish after any most acceptable
fashion; but if he were to do so abruptly it would seem as though he
were attributing something special to the companionship of the other
two. Mr. Kennedy saw his doubt, and asked him to join them. "You may
as well come on, Mr. Finn. We don't dine till eight, and it is not
much past six yet. The men of business are all writing letters, and
the ladies who have been travelling are in bed, I believe."
"Not all of them, Mr. Kennedy," said Lady Laura. Then they went
on with their walk very pleasantly, and the lord of all that they
surveyed took them from one point of vantage to another, till they
both swore that of all spots upon the earth Loughlinter was surely
the most lovely. "I do delight in it, I own," said the lord. "When
I come up here alone, and feel that in the midst of this little bit
of a crowded island I have all this to myself,--all this with which
no other man's wealth can interfere,--I grow proud of my own, till
I become thoroughly ashamed of myself. After all, I believe it is
better to dwell in cities than in the country,--better, at any rate,
for a rich man." Mr. Kennedy had now spoken more words than Phineas
had heard to fall from his lips during the whole time that they had
been acquainted with each other.
"I believe so too," said Laura, "if one were obliged to choose
between the two. For myself, I think that a little of both is good
for man and woman."
"There is no doubt about that," said Phineas.
"No doubt as far as enjoyment goes," said Mr. Kennedy.
He took them up out of the ravine on to the side of the mountain, and
then down by another path through the woods to the back of the house.
As they went he relapsed into his usual silence, and the conversation
was kept up between the other two. At a point not very far from the
castle,--just so far that one could see by the break of the ground
where the castle stood, Kennedy left them. "Mr. Finn will take you
back in safety, I am sure," said he, "and, as I am here, I'll go up
to the farm for a moment. If I don't show myself now and again when I
am here, they think I'm indifferent about the 'bestials'."
"Now, Mr. Kennedy," said Lady Laura, "you are going to pretend to
understand all about sheep and oxen." Mr. Kennedy, owning that it
was so, went away to his farm, and Phineas with Lady Laura returned
towards the house. "I think, upon the whole," said Lady Laura, "that
that is as good a man as I know."
"I should think he is an idle one," said Phineas.
"I doubt that. He is, perhaps, neither zealous nor active. But he is
thoughtful and high-principled, and has a method and a purpose in the
use which he makes of his money. And you see that he has poetry in
his nature too, if you get him upon the right string. How fond he is
of the scenery of this place!"
"Any man would be fond of that. I'm ashamed to say that it almost
makes me envy him. I certainly never have wished to be Mr. Robert
Kennedy in London, but I should like to be the Laird of Loughlinter."
"'Laird of Linn and Laird of Linter,--Here in summer, gone in
winter.' There is some ballad about the old lairds; but that belongs
to a time when Mr. Kennedy had not been heard of, when some branch of
the Mackenzies lived down at that wretched old tower which you see as
you first come upon the lake. When old Mr. Kennedy bought it there
were hardly a hundred acres on the property under cultivation."
"And it belonged to the Mackenzies."
"Yes;--to the Mackenzie of Linn, as he was called. It was Mr.
Kennedy, the old man, who was first called Loughlinter. That is
Linn Castle, and they lived there for hundreds of years. But these
Highlanders, with all that is said of their family pride, have
forgotten the Mackenzies already, and are quite proud of their rich
landlord."
"That is unpoetical," said Phineas.
"Yes;--but then poetry is so usually false. I doubt whether Scotland
would not have been as prosaic a country as any under the sun but for
Walter Scott;--and I have no doubt that Henry V owes the romance of
his character altogether to Shakspeare."
"I sometimes think you despise poetry," said Phineas.
"When it is false I do. The difficulty is to know when it is false
and when it is true. Tom Moore was always false."
"Not so false as Byron," said Phineas with energy.
"Much more so, my friend. But we will not discuss that now. Have you
seen Mr. Monk since you have been here?"
"I have seen no one. I came with Mr. Ratler."
"Why with Mr. Ratler? You cannot find Mr. Ratler a companion much to
your taste."
"Chance brought us together. But Mr. Ratler is a man of sense, Lady
Laura, and is not to be despised."
"It always seems to me," said Lady Laura, "that nothing is to be
gained in politics by sitting at the feet of the little Gamaliels."
"But the great Gamaliels will not have a novice on their footstools."
"Then sit at no man's feet. Is it not astonishing that the price
generally put upon any article by the world is that which the owner
puts on it?--and that this is specially true of a man's own self? If
you herd with Ratler, men will take it for granted that you are a
Ratlerite, and no more. If you consort with Greshams and Pallisers,
you will equally be supposed to know your own place."
"I never knew a Mentor," said Phineas, "so apt as you are to fill his
Telemachus with pride."
"It is because I do not think your fault lies that way. If it did,
or if I thought so, my Telemachus, you may be sure that I should
resign my position as Mentor. Here are Mr. Kennedy and Lady Glencora
and Mrs. Gresham on the steps." Then they went up through the Ionic
columns on to the broad stone terrace before the door, and there they
found a crowd of men and women. For the legislators and statesmen had
written their letters, and the ladies had taken their necessary rest.
Phineas, as he was dressing, considered deeply all that Lady Laura
had said to him,--not so much with reference to the advice which she
had given him, though that also was of importance, as to the fact
that it had been given by her. She had first called herself his
Mentor; but he had accepted the name and had addressed her as her
Telemachus. And yet he believed himself to be older than she,--if,
indeed, there was any difference in their ages. And was it possible
that a female Mentor should love her Telemachus,--should love him as
Phineas desired to be loved by Lady Laura? He would not say that it
was impossible. Perhaps there had been mistakes between them;--a
mistake in his manner of addressing her, and another in hers of
addressing him. Perhaps the old bachelor of forty-three was not
thinking of a wife. Had this old bachelor of forty-three been really
in love with Lady Laura, would he have allowed her to walk home alone
with Phineas, leaving her with some flimsy pretext of having to look
at his sheep? Phineas resolved that he must at any rate play out his
game,--whether he were to lose it or to win it; and in playing it he
must, if possible, drop something of that Mentor and Telemachus style
of conversation. As to the advice given him of herding with Greshams
and Pallisers, instead of with Ratlers and Fitzgibbons,--he must use
that as circumstances might direct. To him, himself, as he thought
of it all, it was sufficiently astonishing that even the Ratlers and
Fitzgibbons should admit him among them as one of themselves. "When
I think of my father and of the old house at Killaloe, and remember
that hitherto I have done nothing myself, I cannot understand how
it is that I should be at Loughlinter." There was only one way of
understanding it. If Lady Laura really loved him, the riddle might
be read.
The rooms at Loughlinter were splendid, much larger and very much
more richly furnished than those at Saulsby. But there was a certain
stiffness in the movement of things, and perhaps in the manner of
some of those present, which was not felt at Saulsby. Phineas at
once missed the grace and prettiness and cheery audacity of Violet
Effingham, and felt at the same time that Violet Effingham would be
out of her element at Loughlinter. At Loughlinter they were met for
business. It was at least a semi-political, or perhaps rather a
semi-official gathering, and he became aware that he ought not to
look simply for amusement. When he entered the drawing-room before
dinner, Mr. Monk and Mr. Palliser, and Mr. Kennedy and Mr. Gresham,
with sundry others, were standing in a wide group before the
fireplace, and among them were Lady Glencora Palliser and Lady Laura
and Mrs. Bonteen. As he approached them it seemed as though a sort
of opening was made for himself; but he could see, though others did
not, that the movement came from Lady Laura.
"I believe, Mr. Monk," said Lady Glencora, "that you and I are the
only two in the whole party who really know what we would be at."
"If I must be divided from so many of my friends," said Mr. Monk, "I
am happy to go astray in the company of Lady Glencora Palliser."
"And might I ask," said Mr. Gresham, with a peculiar smile for which
he was famous, "what it is that you and Mr. Monk are really at?"
"Making men and women all equal," said Lady Glencora. "That I take to
be the gist of our political theory."
"Lady Glencora, I must cry off," said Mr. Monk.
"Yes;--no doubt. If I were in the Cabinet myself I should not admit
so much. There are reticences,--of course. And there is an official
discretion."
"But you don't mean to say, Lady Glencora, that you would really
advocate equality?" said Mrs. Bonteen.
"I do mean to say so, Mrs. Bonteen. And I mean to go further, and to
tell you that you are no Liberal at heart unless you do so likewise;
unless that is the basis of your political aspirations."
"Pray let me speak for myself, Lady Glencora."
"By no means,--not when you are criticising me and my politics. Do
you not wish to make the lower orders comfortable?"
"Certainly," said Mrs. Bonteen.
"And educated, and happy and good?"
"Undoubtedly."
"To make them as comfortable and as good as yourself?"
"Better if possible."
"And I'm sure you wish to make yourself as good and as comfortable as
anybody else,--as those above you, if anybody is above you? You will
admit that?"
"Yes;--if I understand you."
"Then you have admitted everything, and are an advocate for general
equality,--just as Mr. Monk is, and as I am. There is no getting out
of it;--is there, Mr. Kennedy?" Then dinner was announced, and Mr.
Kennedy walked off with the French Republican on his arm. As she
went, she whispered into Mr. Kennedy's ear, "You will understand
me. I am not saying that people are equal; but that the tendency
of all law-making and of all governing should be to reduce the
inequalities." In answer to which Mr. Kennedy said not a word. Lady
Glencora's politics were too fast and furious for his nature.
A week passed by at Loughlinter, at the end of which Phineas found
himself on terms of friendly intercourse with all the political
magnates assembled in the house, but especially with Mr. Monk. He had
determined that he would not follow Lady Laura's advice as to his
selection of companions, if in doing so he should be driven even to
a seeming of intrusion. He made no attempt to sit at the feet of
anybody, and would stand aloof when bigger men than himself were
talking, and was content to be less,--as indeed he was less,--than
Mr. Bonteen or Mr. Ratler. But at the end of a week he found that,
without any effort on his part,--almost in opposition to efforts on
his part,--he had fallen into an easy pleasant way with these men
which was very delightful to him. He had killed a stag in company
with Mr. Palliser, and had stopped beneath a crag to discuss with him
a question as to the duty on Irish malt. He had played chess with Mr.
Gresham, and had been told that gentleman's opinion on the trial of
Mr. Jefferson Davis. Lord Brentford had--at last--called him Finn,
and had proved to him that nothing was known in Ireland about sheep.
But with Mr. Monk he had had long discussions on abstract questions
in politics,--and before the week was over was almost disposed to
call himself a disciple, or, at least, a follower of Mr. Monk. Why
not of Mr. Monk as well as of any one else? Mr. Monk was in the
Cabinet, and of all the members of the Cabinet was the most advanced
Liberal. "Lady Glencora was not so far wrong the other night," Mr.
Monk said to him. "Equality is an ugly word and shouldn't be used. It
misleads, and frightens, and is a bugbear. And she, in using it, had
not perhaps a clearly defined meaning for it in her own mind. But
the wish of every honest man should be to assist in lifting up those
below him, till they be something nearer his own level than he finds
them." To this Phineas assented,--and by degrees he found himself
assenting to a great many things that Mr. Monk said to him.
Mr. Monk was a thin, tall, gaunt man, who had devoted his whole life
to politics, hitherto without any personal reward beyond that which
came to him from the reputation of his name, and from the honour of
a seat in Parliament. He was one of four or five brothers,--and all
besides him were in trade. They had prospered in trade, whereas he
had prospered solely in politics; and men said that he was dependent
altogether on what his relatives supplied for his support. He had now
been in Parliament for more than twenty years, and had been known not
only as a Radical but as a Democrat. Ten years since, when he had
risen to fame, but not to repute, among the men who then governed
England, nobody dreamed that Joshua Monk would ever be a paid servant
of the Crown. He had inveighed against one minister after another
as though they all deserved impeachment. He had advocated political
doctrines which at that time seemed to be altogether at variance
with any possibility of governing according to English rules of
government. He had been regarded as a pestilent thorn in the sides of
all ministers. But now he was a member of the Cabinet, and those whom
he had terrified in the old days began to find that he was not so
much unlike other men. There are but few horses which you cannot put
into harness, and those of the highest spirit will generally do your
work the best.
Phineas, who had his eyes about him, thought that he could perceive
that Mr. Palliser did not shoot a deer with Mr. Ratler, and that Mr.
Gresham played no chess with Mr. Bonteen. Bonteen, indeed, was a
noisy pushing man whom nobody seemed to like, and Phineas wondered
why he should be at Loughlinter, and why he should be in office. His
friend Laurence Fitzgibbon had indeed once endeavoured to explain
this. "A man who can vote hard, as I call it; and who will speak a
few words now and then as they're wanted, without any ambition that
way, may always have his price. And if he has a pretty wife into the
bargain, he ought to have a pleasant time of it." Mr. Ratler no doubt
was a very useful man, who thoroughly knew his business; but yet,
as it seemed to Phineas, no very great distinction was shown to
Mr. Ratler at Loughlinter. "If I got as high as that," he said to
himself, "I should think myself a miracle of luck. And yet nobody
seems to think anything of Ratler. It is all nothing unless one can
go to the very top."
"I believe I did right to accept office," Mr. Monk said to him one
day, as they sat together on a rock close by one of the little
bridges over the Linter. "Indeed, unless a man does so when the bonds
of the office tendered to him are made compatible with his own views,
he declines to proceed on the open path towards the prosecution of
those views. A man who is combating one ministry after another, and
striving to imbue those ministers with his convictions, can hardly
decline to become a minister himself when he finds that those
convictions of his own are henceforth,--or at least for some time to
come,--to be the ministerial convictions of the day. Do you follow
me?"
"Very clearly," said Phineas. "You would have denied your own
children had you refused."
"Unless indeed a man were to feel that he was in some way unfitted
for office work. I very nearly provided for myself an escape on that
plea;--but when I came to sift it, I thought that it would be false.
But let me tell you that the delight of political life is altogether
in opposition. Why, it is freedom against slavery, fire against clay,
movement against stagnation! The very inaccuracy which is permitted
to opposition is in itself a charm worth more than all the patronage
and all the prestige of ministerial power. You'll try them both, and
then say if you do not agree with me. Give me the full swing of the
benches below the gangway, where I needed to care for no one, and
could always enjoy myself on my legs as long as I felt that I was
true to those who sent me there! That is all over now. They have got
me into harness, and my shoulders are sore. The oats, however, are of
the best, and the hay is unexceptionable."
CHAPTER XV
Donald Bean's Pony
Phineas liked being told that the pleasures of opposition and the
pleasures of office were both open to him,--and he liked also to
be the chosen receptacle of Mr. Monk's confidence. He had come to
understand that he was expected to remain ten days at Loughlinter,
and that then there was to be a general movement. Since the first day
he had seen but little of Mr. Kennedy, but he had found himself very
frequently with Lady Laura. And then had come up the question of his
projected trip to Paris with Lord Chiltern. He had received a letter
from Lord Chiltern.
DEAR FINN,
Are you going to Paris with me?
Yours, C.
There had been not a word beyond this, and before he answered it he
made up his mind to tell Lady Laura the truth. He could not go to
Paris because he had no money.
"I've just got that from your brother," said he.
"How like Oswald. He writes to me perhaps three times in the year,
and his letters are just the same. You will go I hope?"
"Well;--no."
"I am sorry for that."
"I wonder whether I may tell you the real reason, Lady Laura."
"Nay;--I cannot answer that; but unless it be some political secret
between you and Mr. Monk, I should think you might."
"I cannot afford to go to Paris this autumn. It seems to be a
shocking admission to make,--though I don't know why it should be."
"Nor I;--but, Mr. Finn, I like you all the better for making it. I
am very sorry, for Oswald's sake. It's so hard to find any companion
for him whom he would like and whom we,--that is I,--should think
altogether--; you know what I mean, Mr. Finn."
"Your wish that I should go with him is a great compliment, and I
thoroughly wish that I could do it. As it is, I must go to Killaloe
and retrieve my finances. I daresay, Lady Laura, you can hardly
conceive how very poor a man I am." There was a melancholy tone
about his voice as he said this, which made her think for the moment
whether or no he had been right in going into Parliament, and whether
she had been right in instigating him to do so. But it was too late
to recur to that question now.
"You must climb into office early, and forego those pleasures of
opposition which are so dear to Mr. Monk," she said, smiling. "After
all, money is an accident which does not count nearly so high as do
some other things. You and Mr. Kennedy have the same enjoyment of
everything around you here."
"Yes; while it lasts."
"And Lady Glencora and I stand pretty much on the same footing, in
spite of all her wealth,--except that she is a married woman. I do
not know what she is worth,--something not to be counted; and I am
worth,--just what papa chooses to give me. A ten-pound note at the
present moment I should look upon as great riches." This was the
first time she had ever spoken to him of her own position as regards
money; but he had heard, or thought that he had heard, that she had
been left a fortune altogether independent of her father.
The last of the ten days had now come, and Phineas was discontented
and almost unhappy. The more he saw of Lady Laura the more he feared
that it was impossible that she should become his wife. And yet from
day to day his intimacy with her became more close. He had never made
love to her, nor could he discover that it was possible for him to
do so. She seemed to be a woman for whom all the ordinary stages of
love-making were quite unsuitable, Of course he could declare his
love and ask her to be his wife on any occasion on which he might
find himself to be alone with her. And on this morning he had made
up his mind that he would do so before the day was over. It might
be possible that she would never speak to him again;--that all the
pleasures and ambitious hopes to which she had introduced him might
be over as soon as that rash word should have been spoken! But,
nevertheless, he would speak it.
On this day there was to be a grouse-shooting party, and the shooters
were to be out early. It had been talked of for some day or two past,
and Phineas knew that he could not escape it. There had been some
rivalry between him and Mr. Bonteen, and there was to be a sort of
match as to which of the two would kill most birds before lunch. But
there had also been some half promise on Lady Laura's part that she
would walk with him up the Linter and come down upon the lake, taking
an opposite direction from that by which they had returned with Mr.
Kennedy.
"But you will be shooting all day," she said, when he proposed it to
her as they were starting for the moor. The waggonet that was to take
them was at the door, and she was there to see them start. Her father
was one of the shooting party, and Mr. Kennedy was another.
"I will undertake to be back in time, if you will not think it too
hot. I shall not see you again till we meet in town next year."
"Then I certainly will go with you,--that is to say, if you are here.
But you cannot return without the rest of the party, as you are going
so far."
"I'll get back somehow," said Phineas, who was resolved that a
few miles more or less of mountain should not detain him from the
prosecution of a task so vitally important to him. "If we start at
five that will be early enough."
"Quite early enough," said Lady Laura.
Phineas went off to the mountains, and shot his grouse, and won his
match, and eat his luncheon. Mr. Bonteen, however, was not beaten by
much, and was in consequence somewhat ill-humoured.
"I'll tell you what I'll do," said Mr. Bonteen, "I'll back myself for
the rest of the day for a ten-pound note."
Now there had been no money staked on the match at all,--but it had
been simply a trial of skill, as to which would kill the most birds
in a given time. And the proposition for that trial had come from Mr.
Bonteen himself. "I should not think of shooting for money," said
Phineas.
"And why not? A bet is the only way to decide these things."
"Partly because I'm sure I shouldn't hit a bird," said Phineas, "and
partly because I haven't got any money to lose."
"I hate bets," said Mr. Kennedy to him afterwards. "I was annoyed
when Bonteen offered the wager. I felt sure, however, you would not
accept it."
"I suppose such bets are very common."
"I don't think men ought to propose them unless they are quite
sure of their company. Maybe I'm wrong, and I often feel that I am
strait-laced about such things. It is so odd to me that men cannot
amuse themselves without pitting themselves against each other. When
a man tells me that he can shoot better than I, I tell him that my
keeper can shoot better than he."
"All the same, it's a good thing to excel," said Phineas.
"I'm not so sure of that," said Mr. Kennedy. "A man who can kill more
salmon than anybody else, can rarely do anything else. Are you going
on with your match?"
"No; I'm going to make my way to Loughlinter."
"Not alone?"
"Yes, alone."
"It's over nine miles. You can't walk it."
Phineas looked at his watch, and found that it was now two o'clock.
It was a broiling day in August, and the way back to Loughlinter, for
six or seven out of the nine miles, would be along a high road. "I
must do it all the same," said he, preparing for a start. "I have an
engagement with Lady Laura Standish; and as this is the last day that
I shall see her, I certainly do not mean to break it."
"An engagement with Lady Laura," said Mr. Kennedy. "Why did you not
tell me, that I might have a pony ready? But come along. Donald Bean
has a pony. He's not much bigger than a dog, but he'll carry you to
Loughlinter."
"I can walk it, Mr. Kennedy."
"Yes; and think of the state in which you'd reach Loughlinter! Come
along with me."
"But I can't take you off the mountain," said Phineas.
"Then you must allow me to take you off."
So Mr. Kennedy led the way down to Donald Bean's cottage, and before
three o'clock Phineas found himself mounted on a shaggy steed, which,
in sober truth, was not much bigger than a large dog. "If Mr. Kennedy
is really my rival," said Phineas to himself, as he trotted along, "I
almost think that I am doing an unhandsome thing in taking the pony."
At five o'clock he was under the portico before the front door, and
there he found Lady Laura waiting for him,--waiting for him, or at
least ready for him. She had on her hat and gloves and light shawl,
and her parasol was in her hand. He thought that he had never seen
her look so young, so pretty, and so fit to receive a lover's vows.
But at the same moment it occurred to him that she was Lady Laura
Standish, the daughter of an Earl, the descendant of a line of
Earls,--and that he was the son of a simple country doctor in
Ireland. Was it fitting that he should ask such a woman to be his
wife? But then Mr. Kennedy was the son of a man who had walked into
Glasgow with half-a-crown in his pocket. Mr. Kennedy's grandfather
had been,--Phineas thought that he had heard that Mr. Kennedy's
grandfather had been a Scotch drover; whereas his own grandfather
had been a little squire near Ennistimon, in county Clare, and his
own first cousin once removed still held the paternal acres at Finn
Grove. His family was supposed to be descended from kings in that
part of Ireland. It certainly did not become him to fear Lady Laura
on the score of rank, if it was to be allowed to Mr. Kennedy to
proceed without fear on that head. As to wealth, Lady Laura had
already told him that her fortune was no greater than his. Her
statement to himself on that head made him feel that he should not
hesitate on the score of money. They neither had any, and he was
willing to work for both. If she feared the risk, let her say so.
It was thus that he argued with himself; but yet he knew,--knew as
well as the reader will know,--that he was going to do that which he
had no right to do. It might be very well for him to wait,--presuming
him to be successful in his love,--for the opening of that oyster
with his political sword, that oyster on which he proposed that they
should both live; but such waiting could not well be to the taste
of Lady Laura Standish. It could hardly be pleasant to her to look
forward to his being made a junior lord or an assistant secretary
before she could establish herself in her home. So he told himself.
And yet he told himself at the same time that it was incumbent on him
to persevere.
"I did not expect you in the least," said Lady Laura.
"And yet I spoke very positively."
"But there are things as to which a man may be very positive, and yet
may be allowed to fail. In the first place, how on earth did you get
home?"
"Mr. Kennedy got me a pony,--Donald Bean's pony."
"You told him, then?"
"Yes; I told him why I was coming, and that I must be here. Then he
took the trouble to come all the way off the mountain to persuade
Donald to lend me his pony. I must acknowledge that Mr. Kennedy has
conquered me at last."
"I am so glad of that," said Lady Laura. "I knew he would,--unless it
were your own fault."
They went up the path by the brook, from bridge to bridge, till they
found themselves out upon the open mountain at the top. Phineas had
resolved that he would not speak out his mind till he found himself
on that spot; that then he would ask her to sit down, and that while
she was so seated he would tell her everything. At the present moment
he had on his head a Scotch cap with a grouse's feather in it, and he
was dressed in a velvet shooting-jacket and dark knickerbockers; and
was certainly, in this costume, as handsome a man as any woman would
wish to see. And there was, too, a look of breeding about him which
had come to him, no doubt, from the royal Finns of old, which ever
served him in great stead. He was, indeed, only Phineas Finn, and
was known by the world to be no more; but he looked as though he
might have been anybody,--a royal Finn himself. And then he had
that special grace of appearing to be altogether unconscious of his
own personal advantages. And I think that in truth he was barely
conscious of them; that he depended on them very little, if at all;
that there was nothing of personal vanity in his composition. He had
never indulged in any hope that Lady Laura would accept him because
he was a handsome man.
"After all that climbing," he said, "will you not sit down for a
moment?" As he spoke to her she looked at him and told herself that
he was as handsome as a god. "Do sit down for one moment," he said.
"I have something that I desire to say to you, and to say it here."
"I will," she said; "but I also have something to tell you, and will
say it while I am yet standing. Yesterday I accepted an offer of
marriage from Mr. Kennedy."
"Then I am too late," said Phineas, and putting his hands into the
pockets of his coat, he turned his back upon her, and walked away
across the mountain.
What a fool he had been to let her know his secret when her knowledge
of it could be of no service to him,--when her knowledge of it could
only make him appear foolish in her eyes! But for his life he could
not have kept his secret to himself. Nor now could he bring himself
to utter a word of even decent civility. But he went on walking as
though he could thus leave her there, and never see her again. What
an ass he had been in supposing that she cared for him! What a fool
to imagine that his poverty could stand a chance against the wealth
of Loughlinter! But why had she lured him on? How he wished that he
were now grinding, hard at work in Mr. Low's chambers, or sitting
at home at Killaloe with the hand of that pretty little Irish girl
within his own!
Presently he heard a voice behind him,--calling him gently. Then he
turned and found that she was very near him. He himself had then
been standing still for some moments, and she had followed him. "Mr.
Finn," she said.
"Well;--yes: what is it?" And turning round he made an attempt to
smile.
"Will you not wish me joy, or say a word of congratulation? Had I not
thought much of your friendship, I should not have been so quick to
tell you of my destiny. No one else has been told, except papa."
"Of course I hope you will be happy. Of course I do. No wonder he
lent me the pony!"
"You must forget all that."
"Forget what?"
"Well,--nothing. You need forget nothing," said Lady Laura, "for
nothing has been said that need be regretted. Only wish me joy, and
all will be pleasant."
"Lady Laura, I do wish you joy, with all my heart,--but that will not
make all things pleasant. I came up here to ask you to be my wife."
"No;--no, no; do not say it."
"But I have said it, and will say it again. I, poor, penniless, plain
simple fool that I am, have been ass enough to love you, Lady Laura
Standish; and I brought you up here to-day to ask you to share with
me--my nothingness. And this I have done on soil that is to be all
your own. Tell me that you regard me as a conceited fool,--as a
bewildered idiot."
"I wish to regard you as a dear friend,--both of my own and of my
husband," said she, offering him her hand.
"Should I have had a chance, I wonder, if I had spoken a week since?"
"How can I answer such a question, Mr. Finn? Or, rather, I will,
answer it fully. It is not a week since we told each other, you to
me and I to you, that we were both poor,--both without other means
than those which come to us from our fathers. You will make your
way;--will make it surely; but how at present could you marry any
woman unless she had money of her own? For me,--like so many other
girls, it was necessary that I should stay at home or marry some one
rich enough to dispense with fortune in a wife. The man whom in all
the world I think the best has asked me to share everything with
him;--and I have thought it wise to accept his offer."
"And I was fool enough to think that you loved me," said Phineas. To
this she made no immediate answer. "Yes, I was. I feel that I owe it
you to tell you what a fool I have been. I did. I thought you loved
me. At least I thought that perhaps you loved me. It was like a child
wanting the moon;--was it not?"
"And why should I not have loved you?" she said slowly, laying her
hand gently upon his arm.
"Why not? Because Loughlinter--"
"Stop, Mr. Finn; stop. Do not say to me any unkind word that I
have not deserved, and that would make a breach between us. I have
accepted the owner of Loughlinter as my husband, because I verily
believe that I shall thus do my duty in that sphere of life to which
it has pleased God to call me. I have always liked him, and I will
love him. For you,--may I trust myself to speak openly to you?"
"You may trust me as against all others, except us two ourselves."
"For you, then, I will say also that I have always liked you since I
knew you; that I have loved you as a friend;--and could have loved
you otherwise had not circumstances showed me so plainly that it
would be unwise."
"Oh, Lady Laura!"
"Listen a moment. And pray remember that what I say to you now must
never be repeated to any ears. No one knows it but my father, my
brother, and Mr. Kennedy. Early in the spring I paid my brother's
debts. His affection to me is more than a return for what I have done
for him. But when I did this,--when I made up my mind to do it, I
made up my mind also that I could not allow myself the same freedom
of choice which would otherwise have belonged to me. Will that be
sufficient, Mr. Finn?"
"How can I answer you, Lady Laura? Sufficient! And you are not angry
with me for what I have said?"
"No, I am not angry. But it is understood, of course, that nothing
of this shall ever be repeated,--even among ourselves. Is that a
bargain?"
"Oh, yes. I shall never speak of it again."
"And now you will wish me joy?"
"I have wished you joy, Lady Laura. And I will do so again. May you
have every blessing which the world can give you. You cannot expect
me to be very jovial for awhile myself; but there will be nobody to
see my melancholy moods. I shall be hiding myself away in Ireland.
When is the marriage to be?"
"Nothing has been said of that. I shall be guided by him,--but there
must, of course, be delay. There will be settlements and I know not
what. It may probably be in the spring,--or perhaps the summer. I
shall do just what my betters tell me to do."
Phineas had now seated himself on the exact stone on which he had
wished her to sit when he proposed to tell his own story, and was
looking forth upon the lake. It seemed to him that everything had
been changed for him while he had been up there upon the mountain,
and that the change had been marvellous in its nature. When he had
been coming up, there had been apparently two alternatives before
him: the glory of successful love,--which, indeed, had seemed to him
to be a most improbable result of the coming interview,--and the
despair and utter banishment attendant on disdainful rejection. But
his position was far removed from either of these alternatives. She
had almost told him that she would have loved him had she not been
poor,--that she was beginning to love him and had quenched her love,
because it had become impossible to her to marry a poor man. In such
circumstances he could not be angry with her,--he could not quarrel
with her; he could not do other than swear to himself that he would
be her friend. And yet he loved her better than ever;--and she was
the promised wife of his rival! Why had not Donald Bean's pony broken
his neck?
"Shall we go down now?" she said.
"Oh, yes."
"You will not go on by the lake?"
"What is the use? It is all the same now. You will want to be back to
receive him in from shooting."
"Not that, I think. He is above those little cares. But it will be as
well we should go the nearest way, as we have spent so much of our
time here. I shall tell Mr. Kennedy that I have told you,--if you do
not mind."
"Tell him what you please," said Phineas.
"But I won't have it taken in that way, Mr. Finn. Your brusque want
of courtesy to me I have forgiven, but I shall expect you to make up
for it by the alacrity of your congratulations to him. I will not
have you uncourteous to Mr. Kennedy."
"If I have been uncourteous I beg your pardon."
"You need not do that. We are old friends, and may take the liberty
of speaking plainly to each other;--but you will owe it to Mr.
Kennedy to be gracious. Think of the pony."
They walked back to the house together, and as they went down the
path very little was said. Just as they were about to come out upon
the open lawn, while they were still under cover of the rocks and
shrubs, Phineas stopped his companion by standing before her, and
then he made his farewell speech to her.
"I must say good-bye to you. I shall be away early in the morning."
"Good-bye, and God bless you," said Lady Laura.
"Give me your hand," said he. And she gave him her hand. "I don't
suppose you know what it is to love dearly."
"I hope I do."
"But to be in love! I believe you do not. And to miss your love! I
think,--I am bound to think that you have never been so tormented. It
is very sore;--but I will do my best, like a man, to get over it."
"Do, my friend, do. So small a trouble will never weigh heavily on
shoulders such as yours."
"It will weigh very heavily, but I will struggle hard that it may not
crush me. I have loved you so dearly! As we are parting give me one
kiss, that I may think of it and treasure it in my memory!" What
murmuring words she spoke to express her refusal of such a request,
I will not quote; but the kiss had been taken before the denial was
completed, and then they walked on in silence together,--and in
peace, towards the house.
On the next morning six or seven men were going away, and there was
an early breakfast. There were none of the ladies there, but Mr.
Kennedy, the host, was among his friends. A large drag with four
horses was there to take the travellers and their luggage to the
station, and there was naturally a good deal of noise at the front
door as the preparations for the departure were made. In the middle
of them Mr. Kennedy took our hero aside. "Laura has told me," said
Mr. Kennedy, "that she has acquainted you with my good fortune."
"And I congratulate you most heartily," said Phineas, grasping the
other's hand. "You are indeed a lucky fellow."
"I feel myself to be so," said Mr. Kennedy. "Such a wife was all that
was wanting to me, and such a wife is very hard to find. Will you
remember, Finn, that Loughlinter will never be so full but what
there will be a room for you, or so empty but what you will be made
welcome? I say this on Lady Laura's part and on my own."
Phineas, as he was being carried away to the railway station, could
not keep himself from speculating as to how much Kennedy knew of
what had taken place during the walk up the Linter. Of one small
circumstance that had occurred, he felt quite sure that Mr. Kennedy
knew nothing.
CHAPTER XVI
Phineas Finn Returns to Killaloe
Phineas Finn's first session of Parliament was over,--his first
session with all its adventures. When he got back to Mrs. Bunce's
house,--for Mrs. Bunce received him for a night in spite of her
husband's advice to the contrary,--I am afraid he almost felt that
Mrs. Bunce and her rooms were beneath him. Of course he was very
unhappy,--as wretched as a man can be; there were moments in which he
thought that it would hardly become him to live unless he could do
something to prevent the marriage of Lady Laura and Mr. Kennedy. But,
nevertheless, he had his consolations. These were reflections which
had in them much of melancholy satisfaction. He had not been despised
by the woman to whom he had told his love. She had not shown him that
she thought him to be unworthy of her. She had not regarded his love
as an offence. Indeed, she had almost told him that prudence alone
had forbidden her to return his passion. And he had kissed her, and
had afterwards parted from her as a dear friend. I do not know why
there should have been a flavour of exquisite joy in the midst of his
agony as he thought of this;--but it was so. He would never kiss her
again. All future delights of that kind would belong to Mr. Kennedy,
and he had no real idea of interfering with that gentleman in the
fruition of his privileges. But still there was the kiss,--an
eternal fact. And then, in all respects except that of his love, his
visit to Loughlinter had been pre-eminently successful. Mr. Monk had
become his friend, and had encouraged him to speak during the next
session,--setting before him various models, and prescribing for him
a course of reading. Lord Brentford had become intimate with him. He
was on pleasant terms with Mr. Palliser and Mr. Gresham. And as for
Mr. Kennedy,--he and Mr. Kennedy were almost bosom friends. It seemed
to him that he had quite surpassed the Ratlers, Fitzgibbons, and
Bonteens in that politico-social success which goes so far towards
downright political success, and which in itself is so pleasant. He
had surpassed these men in spite of their offices and their acquired
positions, and could not but think that even Mr. Low, if he knew it
all, would confess that he had been right.
As to his bosom friendship with Mr. Kennedy, that of course troubled
him. Ought he not to be driving a poniard into Mr. Kennedy's heart?
The conventions of life forbade that; and therefore the bosom
friendship was to be excused. If not an enemy to the death, then
there could be no reason why he should not be a bosom friend.
He went over to Ireland, staying but one night with Mrs. Bunce, and
came down upon them at Killaloe like a god out of the heavens. Even
his father was well-nigh overwhelmed by admiration, and his mother
and sisters thought themselves only fit to minister to his pleasures.
He had learned, if he had learned nothing else, to look as though he
were master of the circumstances around him, and was entirely free
from internal embarrassment. When his father spoke to him about his
legal studies, he did not exactly laugh at his father's ignorance,
but he recapitulated to his father so much of Mr. Monk's wisdom at
second hand,--showing plainly that it was his business to study the
arts of speech and the technicalities of the House, and not to study
law,--that his father had nothing further to say. He had become a
man of such dimensions that an ordinary father could hardly dare to
inquire into his proceedings; and as for an ordinary mother,--such as
Mrs. Finn certainly was,--she could do no more than look after her
son's linen with awe.
Mary Flood Jones,--the reader I hope will not quite have forgotten
Mary Flood Jones,--was in a great tremor when first she met the hero
of Loughshane after returning from the honours of his first session.
She had been somewhat disappointed because the newspapers had not
been full of the speeches he had made in Parliament. And indeed the
ladies of the Finn household had all been ill at ease on this head.
They could not imagine why Phineas had restrained himself with so
much philosophy. But Miss Flood Jones in discussing the matter
with the Miss Finns had never expressed the slightest doubt of his
capacity or his judgment. And when tidings came,--the tidings came
in a letter from Phineas to his father,--that he did not intend to
speak that session, because speeches from a young member on his first
session were thought to be inexpedient, Miss Flood Jones and the Miss
Finns were quite willing to accept the wisdom of this decision, much
as they might regret the effect of it. Mary, when she met her hero,
hardly dared to look him in the face, but she remembered accurately
all the circumstances of her last interview with him. Could it be
that he wore that ringlet near his heart? Mary had received from
Barbara Finn certain hairs supposed to have come from the head of
Phineas, and these she always wore near her own. And moreover, since
she had seen Phineas she had refused an offer of marriage from Mr.
Elias Bodkin,--had refused it almost ignominiously,--and when doing
so had told herself that she would never be false to Phineas Finn.
"We think it so good of you to come to see us again," she said.
"Good to come home to my own people?"
"Of course you might be staying with plenty of grandees if you liked
it."
"No, indeed, Mary. It did happen by accident that I had to go to the
house of a man whom perhaps you would call a grandee, and to meet
grandees there. But it was only for a few days, and I am very glad to
be taken in again here, I can assure you."
"You know how very glad we all are to have you."
"Are you glad to see me, Mary?"
"Very glad. Why should I not be glad, and Barbara the dearest friend
I have in the world? Of course she talks about you,--and that makes
me think of you."
"If you knew, Mary, how often I think about you." Then Mary, who was
very happy at hearing such words, and who was walking in to dinner
with him at the moment, could not refrain herself from pressing his
arm with her little fingers. She knew that Phineas in his position
could not marry at once; but she would wait for him,--oh, for ever,
if he would only ask her. He of course was a wicked traitor to tell
her that he was wont to think of her. But Jove smiles at lovers'
perjuries;--and it is well that he should do so, as such perjuries
can hardly be avoided altogether in the difficult circumstances of a
successful gentleman's life. Phineas was a traitor, of course, but he
was almost forced to be a traitor, by the simple fact that Lady Laura
Standish was in London, and Mary Flood Jones in Killaloe.
He remained for nearly five months at Killaloe, and I doubt whether
his time was altogether well spent. Some of the books recommended
to him by Mr. Monk he probably did read, and was often to be found
encompassed by blue books. I fear that there was a grain of pretence
about his blue books and parliamentary papers, and that in these days
he was, in a gentle way, something of an impostor. "You must not be
angry with me for not going to you," he said once to Mary's mother
when he had declined an invitation to drink tea; "but the fact is
that my time is not my own." "Pray don't make any apologies. We are
quite aware that we have very little to offer," said Mrs. Flood
Jones, who was not altogether happy about Mary, and who perhaps knew
more about members of Parliament and blue books than Phineas Finn had
supposed. "Mary, you are a fool to think of that man," the mother
said to her daughter the next morning. "I don't think of him, mamma;
not particularly." "He is no better than anybody else that I can see,
and he is beginning to give himself airs," said Mrs. Flood Jones.
Mary made no answer; but she went up into her room and swore before a
figure of the Virgin that she would be true to Phineas for ever and
ever, in spite of her mother, in spite of all the world,--in spite,
should it be necessary, even of himself.
About Christmas time there came a discussion between Phineas and his
father about money. "I hope you find you get on pretty well," said
the doctor, who thought that he had been liberal.
"It's a tight fit," said Phineas,--who was less afraid of his father
than he had been when he last discussed these things.
"I had hoped it would have been ample," said the doctor.
"Don't think for a moment, sir, that I am complaining," said Phineas.
"I know it is much more than I have a right to expect."
The doctor began to make an inquiry within his own breast as to
whether his son had a right to expect anything;--whether the time
had not come in which his son should be earning his own bread. "I
suppose," he said, after a pause, "there is no chance of your doing
anything at the bar now?"
"Not immediately. It is almost impossible to combine the two studies
together." Mr. Low himself was aware of that. "But you are not to
suppose that I have given the profession up."
"I hope not,--after all the money it has cost us."
"By no means, sir. And all that I am doing now will, I trust, be of
assistance to me when I shall come back to work at the law. Of course
it is on the cards that I may go into office,--and if so, public
business will become my profession."
"And be turned out with the Ministry!"
"Yes; that is true, sir. I must run my chance. If the worst comes to
the worst, I hope I might be able to secure some permanent place. I
should think that I can hardly fail to do so. But I trust I may never
be driven to want it. I thought, however, that we had settled all
this before." Then Phineas assumed a look of injured innocence, as
though his father was driving him too hard.
"And in the mean time your money has been enough?" said the doctor,
after a pause.
"I had intended to ask you to advance me a hundred pounds," said
Phineas. "There were expenses to which I was driven on first entering
Parliament."
"A hundred pounds."
"If it be inconvenient, sir, I can do without it." He had not as
yet paid for his gun, or for that velvet coat in which he had been
shooting, or, most probably, for the knickerbockers. He knew he
wanted the hundred pounds badly; but he felt ashamed of himself in
asking for it. If he were once in office,--though the office were but
a sorry junior lordship,--he would repay his father instantly.
"You shall have it, of course," said the doctor; "but do not let the
necessity for asking for more hundreds come oftener than you can
help." Phineas said that he would not, and then there was no further
discourse about money. It need hardly be said that he told his father
nothing of that bill which he had endorsed for Laurence Fitzgibbon.
At last came the time which called him again to London and the
glories of London life,--to lobbies, and the clubs, and the gossip of
men in office, and the chance of promotion for himself; to the glare
of the gas-lamps, the mock anger of rival debaters, and the prospect
of the Speaker's wig. During the idleness of the recess he had
resolved at any rate upon this,--that a month of the session should
not have passed by before he had been seen upon his legs in the
House,--had been seen and heard. And many a time as he had wandered
alone, with his gun, across the bogs which lie on the other side of
the Shannon from Killaloe, he had practised the sort of address which
he would make to the House. He would be short,--always short; and he
would eschew all action and gesticulation; Mr. Monk had been very
urgent in his instructions to him on that head; but he would be
especially careful that no words should escape him which had not in
them some purpose. He might be wrong in his purpose, but purpose
there should be. He had been twitted more than once at Killaloe
with his silence;--for it had been conceived by his fellow-townsmen
that he had been sent to Parliament on the special ground of his
eloquence. They should twit him no more on his next return. He would
speak and would carry the House with him if a human effort might
prevail.
So he packed up his things, and started again for London in the
beginning of February. "Good-bye, Mary," he said with his sweetest
smile. But on this occasion there was no kiss, and no culling of
locks. "I know he cannot help it," said Mary to herself. "It is his
position. But whether it be for good or evil, I will be true to him."
"I am afraid you are unhappy," Babara Finn said to her on the next
morning.
"No; I am not unhappy,--not at all. I have a deal to make me happy
and proud. I don't mean to be a bit unhappy." Then she turned away
and cried heartily, and Barbara Finn cried with her for company.
CHAPTER XVII
Phineas Finn Returns to London
Phineas had received two letters during his recess at Killaloe from
two women who admired him much, which, as they were both short, shall
be submitted to the reader. The first was as follows:--
Saulsby, October 20, 186--.
MY DEAR MR. FINN,
I write a line to tell you that our marriage is to be
hurried on as quickly as possible. Mr. Kennedy does not
like to be absent from Parliament; nor will he be content
to postpone the ceremony till the session be over. The day
fixed is the 3rd of December, and we then go at once to
Rome, and intend to be back in London by the opening of
Parliament.
Yours most sincerely,
LAURA STANDISH.
Our London address will be No. 52, Grosvenor Place.
To this he wrote an answer as short, expressing his ardent wishes
that those winter hymeneals might produce nothing but happiness, and
saying that he would not be in town many days before he knocked at
the door of No. 52, Grosvenor Place.
And the second letter was as follows:--
Great Marlborough Street, December, 186--.
DEAR AND HONOURED SIR,
Bunce is getting ever so anxious about the rooms, and
says as how he has a young Equity draftsman and wife and
baby as would take the whole house, and all because Miss
Pouncefoot said a word about her port wine, which any lady
of her age might say in her tantrums, and mean nothing
after all. Me and Miss Pouncefoot's knowed each other for
seven years, and what's a word or two as isn't meant after
that? But, honoured sir, it's not about that as I write
to trouble you, but to ask if I may say for certain that
you'll take the rooms again in February. It's easy to
let them for the month after Christmas, because of the
pantomimes. Only say at once, because Bunce is nagging
me day after day. I don't want nobody's wife and baby to
have to do for, and 'd sooner have a Parliament gent like
yourself than any one else.
Yours umbly and respectful,
JANE BUNCE.
To this he replied that he would certainly come back to the rooms
in Great Marlborough Street, should he be lucky enough to find them
vacant, and he expressed his willingness to take them on and from
the 1st of February. And on the 3rd of February he found himself in
the old quarters, Mrs. Bunce having contrived, with much conjugal
adroitness, both to keep Miss Pouncefoot and to stave off the Equity
draftsman's wife and baby. Bunce, however, received Phineas very
coldly, and told his wife the same evening that as far as he could
see their lodger would never turn up to be a trump in the matter of
the ballot. "If he means well, why did he go and stay with them lords
down in Scotland? I knows all about it. I knows a man when I sees
him. Mr. Low, who's looking out to be a Tory judge some of these
days, is a deal better;--because he knows what he's after."
Immediately on his return to town, Phineas found himself summoned to
a political meeting at Mr. Mildmay's house in St. James's Square.
"We're going to begin in earnest this time," Barrington Erle said to
him at the club.
"I am glad of that," said Phineas.
"I suppose you heard all about it down at Loughlinter?"
Now, in truth, Phineas had heard very little of any settled plan down
at Loughlinter. He had played a game of chess with Mr. Gresham, and
had shot a stag with Mr. Palliser, and had discussed sheep with Lord
Brentford, but had hardly heard a word about politics from any one
of those influential gentlemen. From Mr. Monk he had heard much of a
coming Reform Bill; but his communications with Mr. Monk had rather
been private discussions,--in which he had learned Mr. Monk's own
views on certain points,--than revelations on the intention of the
party to which Mr. Monk belonged. "I heard of nothing settled," said
Phineas; "but I suppose we are to have a Reform Bill."
"That is a matter of course."
"And I suppose we are not to touch the question of ballot."
"That's the difficulty," said Barrington Erle. "But of course we
shan't touch it as long as Mr. Mildmay is in the Cabinet. He will
never consent to the ballot as First Minister of the Crown."
"Nor would Gresham, or Palliser," said Phineas, who did not choose to
bring forward his greatest gun at first.
"I don't know about Gresham. It is impossible to say what Gresham
might bring himself to do. Gresham is a man who may go any lengths
before he has done. Planty Pall,"--for such was the name by which Mr.
Plantagenet Palliser was ordinarily known among his friends,--"would
of course go with Mr. Mildmay and the Duke."
"And Monk is opposed to the ballot," said Phineas.
"Ah, that's the question. No doubt he has assented to the proposition
of a measure without the ballot; but if there should come a row, and
men like Turnbull demand it, and the London mob kick up a shindy, I
don't know how far Monk would be steady."
"Whatever he says, he'll stick to."
"He is your leader, then?" asked Barrington.
"I don't know that I have a leader. Mr. Mildmay leads our side; and
if anybody leads me, he does. But I have great faith in Mr. Monk."
"There's one who would go for the ballot to-morrow, if it were
brought forward stoutly," said Barrington Erle to Mr. Ratler a few
minutes afterwards, pointing to Phineas as he spoke.
"I don't think much of that young man," said Ratler.
Mr. Bonteen and Mr. Ratler had put their heads together during that
last evening at Loughlinter, and had agreed that they did not think
much of Phineas Finn. Why did Mr. Kennedy go down off the mountain
to get him a pony? And why did Mr. Gresham play chess with him? Mr.
Ratler and Mr. Bonteen may have been right in making up their minds
to think but little of Phineas Finn, but Barrington Erle had been
quite wrong when he had said that Phineas would "go for the ballot"
to-morrow. Phineas had made up his mind very strongly that he would
always oppose the ballot. That he would hold the same opinion
throughout his life, no one should pretend to say; but in his present
mood, and under the tuition which he had received from Mr. Monk,
he was prepared to demonstrate, out of the House and in it, that
the ballot was, as a political measure, unmanly, ineffective, and
enervating. Enervating had been a great word with Mr. Monk, and
Phineas had clung to it with admiration.
The meeting took place at Mr. Mildmay's on the third day of the
session. Phineas had of course heard of such meetings before, but had
never attended one. Indeed, there had been no such gathering when
Mr. Mildmay's party came into power early in the last session. Mr.
Mildmay and his men had then made their effort in turning out their
opponents, and had been well pleased to rest awhile upon their oars.
Now, however, they must go again to work, and therefore the liberal
party was collected at Mr. Mildmay's house, in order that the liberal
party might be told what it was that Mr. Mildmay and his Cabinet
intended to do.
Phineas Finn was quite in the dark as to what would be the nature
of the performance on this occasion, and entertained some idea that
every gentleman present would be called upon to express individually
his assent or dissent in regard to the measure proposed. He walked to
St. James's Square with Laurence Fitzgibbon; but even with Fitzgibbon
was ashamed to show his ignorance by asking questions. "After all,"
said Fitzgibbon, "this kind of thing means nothing. I know as well as
possible, and so do you, what Mr. Mildmay will say,--and then Gresham
will say a few words; and then Turnbull will make a murmur, and then
we shall all assent,--to anything or to nothing;--and then it will be
over." Still Phineas did not understand whether the assent required
would or would not be an individual personal assent. When the affair
was over he found that he was disappointed, and that he might almost
as well have stayed away from the meeting,--except that he had
attended at Mr. Mildmay's bidding, and had given a silent adhesion to
Mr. Mildmay's plan of reform for that session. Laurence Fitzgibbon
had been very nearly correct in his description of what would occur.
Mr. Mildmay made a long speech. Mr. Turnbull, the great Radical of
the day,--the man who was supposed to represent what many called the
Manchester school of politics,--asked half a dozen questions. In
answer to these Mr. Gresham made a short speech. Then Mr. Mildmay
made another speech, and then all was over. The gist of the whole
thing was, that there should be a Reform Bill,--very generous in its
enlargement of the franchise,--but no ballot. Mr. Turnbull expressed
his doubt whether this would be satisfactory to the country; but even
Mr. Turnbull was soft in his tone and complaisant in his manner. As
there was no reporter present,--that plan of turning private meetings
at gentlemen's houses into public assemblies not having been as yet
adopted,--there could be no need for energy or violence. They went to
Mr. Mildmay's house to hear Mr. Mildmay's plan,--and they heard it.
Two days after this Phineas was to dine with Mr. Monk. Mr. Monk had
asked him in the lobby of the House. "I don't give dinner parties,"
he said, "but I should like you to come and meet Mr. Turnbull."
Phineas accepted the invitation as a matter of course. There were
many who said that Mr. Turnbull was the greatest man in the nation,
and that the nation could be saved only by a direct obedience to
Mr. Turnbull's instructions. Others said that Mr. Turnbull was a
demagogue and at heart a rebel; that he was un-English, false and
very dangerous. Phineas was rather inclined to believe the latter
statement; and as danger and dangerous men are always more attractive
than safety and safe men, he was glad to have an opportunity of
meeting Mr. Turnbull at dinner.
In the meantime he went to call on Lady Laura, whom he had not
seen since the last evening which he spent in her company at
Loughlinter,--whom, when he was last speaking to her, he had kissed
close beneath the falls of the Linter. He found her at home, and with
her was her husband. "Here is a Darby and Joan meeting, is it not?"
she said, getting up to welcome him. He had seen Mr. Kennedy before,
and had been standing close to him during the meeting at Mr.
Mildmay's.
"I am very glad to find you both together."
"But Robert is going away this instant," said Lady Laura. "Has he
told you of our adventures at Rome?"
"Not a word."
"Then I must tell you;--but not now. The dear old Pope was so civil
to us. I came to think it quite a pity that he should be in trouble."
"I must be off," said the husband, getting up. "But I shall meet you
at dinner, I believe."
"Do you dine at Mr. Monk's?"
"Yes, and am asked expressly to hear Turnbull make a convert of you.
There are only to be us four. Au revoir." Then Mr. Kennedy went, and
Phineas found himself alone with Lady Laura. He hardly knew how to
address her, and remained silent. He had not prepared himself for the
interview as he ought to have done, and felt himself to be awkward.
She evidently expected him to speak, and for a few seconds sat
waiting for what he might say.
At last she found that it was incumbent on her to begin. "Were you
surprised at our suddenness when you got my note?"
"A little. You had spoken of waiting."
"I had never imagined that he would have been impetuous. And he seems
to think that even the business of getting himself married would not
justify him staying away from Parliament. He is a rigid martinet in
all matters of duty."
"I did not wonder that he should be in a hurry, but that you should
submit."
"I told you that I should do just what the wise people told me. I
asked papa, and he said that it would be better. So the lawyers were
driven out of their minds, and the milliners out of their bodies, and
the thing was done."
"Who was there at the marriage?"
"Oswald was not there. That I know is what you mean to ask. Papa said
that he might come if he pleased. Oswald stipulated that he should be
received as a son. Then my father spoke the hardest word that ever
fell from his mouth."
"What did he say?"
"I will not repeat it,--not altogether. But he said that Oswald was
not entitled to a son's treatment. He was very sore about my money,
because Robert was so generous as to his settlement. So the breach
between them is as wide as ever."
"And where is Chiltern now?" said Phineas.
"Down in Northamptonshire, staying at some inn from whence he hunts.
He tells me that he is quite alone,--that he never dines out, never
has any one to dine with him, that he hunts five or six days a
week,--and reads at night."
"That is not a bad sort of life."
"Not if the reading is any good. But I cannot bear that he should be
so solitary. And if he breaks down in it, then his companions will
not be fit for him. Do you ever hunt?"
"Oh yes,--at home in county Clare. All Irishmen hunt."
"I wish you would go down to him and see him. He would be delighted
to have you."
Phineas thought over the proposition before he answered it, and then
made the reply that he had made once before. "I would do so, Lady
Laura,--but that I have no money for hunting in England."
"Alas, alas!" said she, smiling. "How that hits one on every side!"
"I might manage it,--for a couple of days,--in March."
"Do not do what you think you ought not to do," said Lady Laura.
"No; certainly. But I should like it, and if I can I will."
"He could mount you, I have no doubt. He has no other expense now,
and keeps a stable full of horses. I think he has seven or eight. And
now tell me, Mr. Finn; when are you going to charm the House? Or is
it your first intention to strike terror?"
He blushed,--he knew that he blushed as he answered. "Oh, I suppose I
shall make some sort of attempt before long. I can't bear the idea of
being a bore."
"I think you ought to speak, Mr. Finn."
"I do not know about that, but I certainly mean to try. There will be
lots of opportunities about the new Reform Bill. Of course you know
that Mr. Mildmay is going to bring it in at once. You hear all that
from Mr. Kennedy."
"And papa has told me. I still see papa almost every day. You must
call upon him. Mind you do." Phineas said that he certainly would.
"Papa is very lonely now, and I sometimes feel that I have been
almost cruel in deserting him. And I think that he has a horror of
the house,--especially later in the year,--always fancying that he
will meet Oswald. I am so unhappy about it all, Mr. Finn."
"Why doesn't your brother marry?" said Phineas, knowing nothing as
yet of Lord Chiltern and Violet Effingham. "If he were to marry well,
that would bring your father round."
"Yes,--it would."
"And why should he not?"
Lady Laura paused before she answered; and then she told the whole
story. "He is violently in love, and the girl he loves has refused
him twice."
"Is it with Miss Effingham?" asked Phineas, guessing the truth at
once, and remembering what Miss Effingham had said to him when riding
in the wood.
"Yes;--with Violet Effingham; my father's pet, his favourite, whom he
loves next to myself,--almost as well as myself; whom he would really
welcome as a daughter. He would gladly make her mistress of his
house, and of Saulsby. Everything would then go smoothly."
"But she does not like Lord Chiltern?"
"I believe she loves him in her heart; but she is afraid of him. As
she says herself, a girl is bound to be so careful of herself. With
all her seeming frolic, Violet Effingham is very wise."
Phineas, though not conscious of anything akin to jealousy, was
annoyed at the revelation made to him. Since he had heard that Lord
Chiltern was in love with Miss Effingham, he did not like Lord
Chiltern quite as well as he had done before. He himself had simply
admired Miss Effingham, and had taken pleasure in her society; but,
though this had been all, he did not like to hear of another man
wanting to marry her, and he was almost angry with Lady Laura for
saying that she believed Miss Effingham loved her brother. If Miss
Effingham had twice refused Lord Chiltern, that ought to have been
sufficient. It was not that Phineas was in love with Miss Effingham
himself. As he was still violently in love with Lady Laura, any other
love was of course impossible; but, nevertheless, there was something
offensive to him in the story as it had been told. "If it be wisdom
on her part," said he, answering Lady Laura's last words, "you cannot
find fault with her for her decision."
"I find no fault;--but I think my brother would make her happy."
Lady Laura, when she was left alone, at once reverted to the tone in
which Phineas Finn had answered her remarks about Miss Effingham.
Phineas was very ill able to conceal his thoughts, and wore his heart
almost upon his sleeve. "Can it be possible that he cares for her
himself?" That was the nature of Lady Laura's first question to
herself upon the matter. And in asking herself that question, she
thought nothing of the disparity in rank or fortune between Phineas
Finn and Violet Effingham. Nor did it occur to her as at all
improbable that Violet might accept the love of him who had so lately
been her own lover. But the idea grated against her wishes on two
sides. She was most anxious that Violet should ultimately become her
brother's wife,--and she could not be pleased that Phineas should be
able to love any woman.
I must beg my readers not to be carried away by those last words
into any erroneous conclusion. They must not suppose that Lady Laura
Kennedy, the lately married bride, indulged a guilty passion for the
young man who had loved her. Though she had probably thought often
of Phineas Finn since her marriage, her thoughts had never been of
a nature to disturb her rest. It had never occurred to her even to
think that she regarded him with any feeling that was an offence
to her husband. She would have hated herself had any such idea
presented itself to her mind. She prided herself on being a pure
high-principled woman, who had kept so strong a guard upon herself as
to be nearly free from the dangers of those rocks upon which other
women made shipwreck of their happiness. She took pride in this, and
would then blame herself for her own pride. But though she so blamed
herself, it never occurred to her to think that to her there might be
danger of such shipwreck. She had put away from herself the idea of
love when she had first perceived that Phineas had regarded her with
more than friendship, and had accepted Mr. Kennedy's offer with an
assured conviction that by doing so she was acting best for her own
happiness and for that of all those concerned. She had felt the
romance of the position to be sweet when Phineas had stood with her
at the top of the falls of the Linter, and had told her of the hopes
which he had dared to indulge. And when at the bottom of the falls he
had presumed to take her in his arms, she had forgiven him without
difficulty to herself, telling herself that that would be the alpha
and the omega of the romance of her life. She had not felt herself
bound to tell Mr. Kennedy of what had occurred,--but she had felt
that he could hardly have been angry even had he been told. And she
had often thought of her lover since, and of his love,--telling
herself that she too had once had a lover, never regarding her
husband in that light; but her thoughts had not frightened her as
guilty thoughts will do. There had come a romance which had been
pleasant, and it was gone. It had been soon banished,--but it
had left to her a sweet flavour, of which she loved to taste the
sweetness though she knew that it was gone. And the man should be her
friend, but especially her husband's friend. It should be her care to
see that his life was successful,--and especially her husband's care.
It was a great delight to her to know that her husband liked the man.
And the man would marry, and the man's wife should be her friend. All
this had been very pure and very pleasant. Now an idea had flitted
across her brain that the man was in love with some one else,--and
she did not like it!
But she did not therefore become afraid of herself, or in the least
realise at once the danger of her own position. Her immediate glance
at the matter did not go beyond the falseness of men. If it were so,
as she suspected,--if Phineas had in truth transferred his affections
to Violet Effingham, of how little value was the love of such a man!
It did not occur to her at this moment that she also had transferred
hers to Robert Kennedy, or that, if not, she had done worse. But she
did remember that in the autumn this young Phoebus among men had
turned his back upon her out upon the mountain that he might hide
from her the agony of his heart when he learned that she was to be
the wife of another man; and that now, before the winter was over, he
could not hide from her the fact that his heart was elsewhere! And
then she speculated, and counted up facts, and satisfied herself that
Phineas could not even have seen Violet Effingham since they two had
stood together upon the mountain. How false are men!--how false and
how weak of heart!
"Chiltern and Violet Effingham!" said Phineas to himself, as he
walked away from Grosvenor Place. "Is it fair that she should be
sacrificed because she is rich, and because she is so winning and so
fascinating that Lord Brentford would receive even his son for the
sake of receiving also such a daughter-in-law?" Phineas also liked
Lord Chiltern; had seen or fancied that he had seen fine things in
him; had looked forward to his regeneration, hoping, perhaps, that he
might have some hand in the good work. But he did not recognise the
propriety of sacrificing Violet Effingham even for work so good as
this. If Miss Effingham had refused Lord Chiltern twice, surely that
ought to be sufficient. It did not occur to him that the love of such
a girl as Violet would be a great treasure--to himself. As regarded
himself, he was still in love,--hopelessly in love, with Lady Laura
Kennedy!
CHAPTER XVIII
Mr. Turnbull
It was a Wednesday evening and there was no House;--and at seven
o'clock Phineas was at Mr. Monk's hall door. He was the first of the
guests, and he found Mr. Monk alone in the dining-room. "I am doing
butler," said Mr. Monk, who had a brace of decanters in his hands,
which he proceeded to put down in the neighbourhood of the fire.
"But I have finished, and now we will go up-stairs to receive the
two great men properly."
"I beg your pardon for coming too early," said Finn.
"Not a minute too early. Seven is seven, and it is I who am too late.
But, Lord bless you, you don't think I'm ashamed of being found in
the act of decanting my own wine! I remember Lord Palmerston saying
before some committee about salaries, five or six years ago now, I
daresay, that it wouldn't do for an English Minister to have his hall
door opened by a maid-servant. Now, I'm an English Minister, and
I've got nobody but a maid-servant to open my hall door, and I'm
obliged to look after my own wine. I wonder whether it's improper? I
shouldn't like to be the means of injuring the British Constitution."
"Perhaps if you resign soon, and if nobody follows your example,
grave evil results may be avoided."
"I sincerely hope so, for I do love the British Constitution; and I
love also the respect in which members of the English Cabinet are
held. Now Turnbull, who will be here in a moment, hates it all; but
he is a rich man, and has more powdered footmen hanging about his
house than ever Lord Palmerston had himself."
"He is still in business."
"Oh yes;--and makes his thirty thousand a year. Here he is. How are
you, Turnbull? We were talking about my maid-servant. I hope she
opened the door for you properly."
"Certainly,--as far as I perceived," said Mr. Turnbull, who was
better at a speech than a joke. "A very respectable young woman I
should say."
"There is not one more so in all London," said Mr. Monk; "but Finn
seems to think that I ought to have a man in livery."
"It is a matter of perfect indifference to me," said Mr. Turnbull.
"I am one of those who never think of such things."
"Nor I either," said Mr. Monk. Then the laird of Loughlinter was
announced, and they all went down to dinner.
Mr. Turnbull was a good-looking robust man about sixty, with long
grey hair and a red complexion, with hard eyes, a well-cut nose, and
full lips. He was nearly six feet high, stood quite upright, and
always wore a black swallow-tail coat, black trousers, and a black
silk waistcoat. In the House, at least, he was always so dressed, and
at dinner tables. What difference there might be in his costume when
at home at Staleybridge few of those who saw him in London had the
means of knowing. There was nothing in his face to indicate special
talent. No one looking at him would take him to be a fool; but there
was none of the fire of genius in his eye, nor was there in the lines
of his mouth any of that play of thought or fancy which is generally
to be found in the faces of men and women who have made themselves
great. Mr. Turnbull had certainly made himself great, and could
hardly have done so without force of intellect. He was one of the
most popular, if not the most popular politician in the country. Poor
men believed in him, thinking that he was their most honest public
friend; and men who were not poor believed in his power, thinking
that his counsels must surely prevail. He had obtained the ear of the
House and the favour of the reporters, and opened his voice at no
public dinner, on no public platform, without a conviction that the
words spoken by him would be read by thousands. The first necessity
for good speaking is a large audience; and of this advantage Mr.
Turnbull had made himself sure. And yet it could hardly be said that
he was a great orator. He was gifted with a powerful voice, with
strong, and I may, perhaps, call them broad convictions, with perfect
self-reliance, with almost unlimited powers of endurance, with hot
ambition, with no keen scruples, and with a moral skin of great
thickness. Nothing said against him pained him, no attacks wounded
him, no raillery touched him in the least. There was not a sore spot
about him, and probably his first thoughts on waking every morning
told him that he, at least, was totus teres atque rotundus. He was,
of course, a thorough Radical,--and so was Mr. Monk. But Mr. Monk's
first waking thoughts were probably exactly the reverse of those
of his friend. Mr. Monk was a much hotter man in debate than Mr.
Turnbull;--but Mr. Monk was ever doubting of himself, and never
doubted of himself so much as when he had been most violent, and
also most effective, in debate. When Mr. Monk jeered at himself for
being a Cabinet Minister and keeping no attendant grander than a
parlour-maid, there was a substratum of self-doubt under the joke.
Mr. Turnbull was certainly a great Radical, and as such enjoyed a
great reputation. I do not think that high office in the State had
ever been offered to him; but things had been said which justified
him, or seemed to himself to justify him, in declaring that in
no possible circumstances would he serve the Crown. "I serve the
people," he had said, "and much as I respect the servants of the
Crown, I think that my own office is the higher." He had been greatly
called to task for this speech; and Mr. Mildmay, the present Premier,
had asked him whether he did not recognise the so-called servants of
the Crown as the most hard-worked and truest servants of the people.
The House and the press had supported Mr. Mildmay, but to all that
Mr. Turnbull was quite indifferent; and when an assertion made by him
before three or four thousand persons at Manchester, to the effect
that he,--he specially,--was the friend and servant of the people,
was received with acclamation, he felt quite satisfied that he had
gained his point. Progressive reform in the franchise, of which
manhood suffrage should be the acknowledged and not far distant end,
equal electoral districts, ballot, tenant right for England as well
as Ireland, reduction of the standing army till there should be no
standing army to reduce, utter disregard of all political movements
in Europe, an almost idolatrous admiration for all political
movements in America, free trade in everything except malt, and
an absolute extinction of a State Church,--these were among the
principal articles in Mr. Turnbull's political catalogue. And I
think that when once he had learned the art of arranging his words
as he stood upon his legs, and had so mastered his voice as to
have obtained the ear of the House, the work of his life was not
difficult. Having nothing to construct, he could always deal with
generalities. Being free from responsibility, he was not called upon
either to study details or to master even great facts. It was his
business to inveigh against existing evils, and perhaps there is
no easier business when once the privilege of an audience has been
attained. It was his work to cut down forest-trees, and he had
nothing to do with the subsequent cultivation of the land. Mr.
Monk had once told Phineas Finn how great were the charms of that
inaccuracy which was permitted to the Opposition. Mr. Turnbull no
doubt enjoyed these charms to the full, though he would sooner have
put a padlock on his mouth for a month than have owned as much. Upon
the whole, Mr. Turnbull was no doubt right in resolving that he would
not take office, though some reticence on that subject might have
been more becoming to him.
The conversation at dinner, though it was altogether on political
subjects, had in it nothing of special interest as long as the girl
was there to change the plates; but when she was gone, and the door
was closed, it gradually opened out, and there came on to be a
pleasant sparring match between the two great Radicals,--the Radical
who had joined himself to the governing powers, and the Radical who
stood aloof. Mr. Kennedy barely said a word now and then, and Phineas
was almost as silent as Mr. Kennedy. He had come there to hear some
such discussion, and was quite willing to listen while guns of such
great calibre were being fired off for his amusement.
"I think Mr. Mildmay is making a great step forward," said Mr.
Turnbull.
"I think he is," said Mr. Monk.
"I did not believe that he would ever live to go so far. It will
hardly suffice even for this year; but still coming from him, it is
a great deal. It only shows how far a man may be made to go, if only
the proper force be applied. After all, it matters very little who
are the Ministers."
"That is what I have always declared," said Mr. Monk.
"Very little indeed. We don't mind whether it be Lord de Terrier, or
Mr. Mildmay, or Mr. Gresham, or you yourself, if you choose to get
yourself made First Lord of the Treasury."
"I have no such ambition, Turnbull."
"I should have thought you had. If I went in for that kind of thing
myself, I should like to go to the top of the ladder. I should feel
that if I could do any good at all by becoming a Minister, I could
only do it by becoming first Minister."
"You wouldn't doubt your own fitness for such a position?"
"I doubt my fitness for the position of any Minister," said Mr.
Turnbull.
"You mean that on other grounds," said Mr. Kennedy.
"I mean it on every ground," said Mr. Turnbull, rising on his legs
and standing with his back to the fire. "Of course I am not fit to
have diplomatic intercourse with men who would come to me simply with
the desire of deceiving me. Of course I am unfit to deal with members
of Parliament who would flock around me because they wanted places.
Of course I am unfit to answer every man's question so as to give no
information to any one."
"Could you not answer them so as to give information?" said Mr.
Kennedy.
But Mr. Turnbull was so intent on his speech that it may be doubted
whether he heard this interruption. He took no notice of it as he
went on. "Of course I am unfit to maintain the proprieties of a
seeming confidence between a Crown all-powerless and a people
all-powerful. No man recognises his own unfitness for such work more
clearly than I do, Mr. Monk. But if I took in hand such work at all,
I should like to be the leader, and not the led. Tell us fairly, now,
what are your convictions worth in Mr. Mildmay's Cabinet?"
"That is a question which a man may hardly answer himself," said Mr.
Monk.
"It is a question which a man should at least answer for himself
before he consents to sit there," said Mr. Turnbull, in a tone of
voice which was almost angry.
"And what reason have you for supposing that I have omitted that
duty?" said Mr. Monk.
"Simply this,--that I cannot reconcile your known opinions with the
practices of your colleagues."
"I will not tell you what my convictions may be worth in Mr.
Mildmay's Cabinet. I will not take upon myself to say that they are
worth the chair on which I sit when I am there. But I will tell you
what my aspirations were when I consented to fill that chair, and you
shall judge of their worth. I thought that they might possibly leaven
the batch of bread which we have to bake,--giving to the whole batch
more of the flavour of reform than it would have possessed had I
absented myself. I thought that when I was asked to join Mr. Mildmay
and Mr. Gresham, the very fact of that request indicated liberal
progress, and that if I refused the request I should be declining to
assist in good work."
"You could have supported them, if anything were proposed worthy of
support," said Mr. Turnbull.
"Yes; but I could not have been so effective in taking care that
some measure be proposed worthy of support as I may possibly be now.
I thought a good deal about it, and I believe that my decision was
right."
"I am sure you were right," said Mr. Kennedy.
"There can be no juster object of ambition than a seat in the
Cabinet," said Phineas.
"Sir, I must dispute that," said Mr. Turnbull, turning round upon our
hero. "I regard the position of our high Ministers as most
respectable."
"Thank you for so much," said Mr. Monk. But the orator went on again,
regardless of the interruption:--
"The position of gentlemen in inferior offices,--of gentlemen who
attend rather to the nods and winks of their superiors in Downing
Street than to the interest of their constituents,--I do not regard
as being highly respectable."
"A man cannot begin at the top," said Phineas.
"Our friend Mr. Monk has begun at what you are pleased to call the
top," said Mr. Turnbull. "But I will not profess to think that even
he has raised himself by going into office. To be an independent
representative of a really popular commercial constituency is, in my
estimation, the highest object of an Englishman's ambition."
"But why commercial, Mr. Turnbull?" said Mr. Kennedy.
"Because the commercial constituencies really do elect their own
members in accordance with their own judgments, whereas the counties
and the small towns are coerced either by individuals or by a
combination of aristocratic influences."
"And yet," said Mr. Kennedy, "there are not half a dozen
Conservatives returned by all the counties in Scotland."
"Scotland is very much to be honoured," said Mr. Turnbull.
Mr. Kennedy was the first to take his departure, and Mr. Turnbull
followed him very quickly. Phineas got up to go at the same time, but
stayed at his host's request, and sat for awhile smoking a cigar.
"Turnbull is a wonderful man," said Mr. Monk.
"Does he not domineer too much?"
"His fault is not arrogance, so much as ignorance that there is,
or should be, a difference between public and private life. In the
House of Commons a man in Mr. Turnbull's position must speak with
dictatorial assurance. He is always addressing, not the House only,
but the country at large, and the country will not believe in him
unless he believe in himself. But he forgets that he is not always
addressing the country at large. I wonder what sort of a time Mrs.
Turnbull and the little Turnbulls have of it?"
Phineas, as he went home, made up his mind that Mrs. Turnbull and
the little Turnbulls must probably have a bad time of it.
CHAPTER XIX
Lord Chiltern Rides His Horse Bonebreaker
It was known that whatever might be the details of Mr. Mildmay's
bill, the ballot would not form a part of it; and as there was a
strong party in the House of Commons, and a very numerous party out
of it, who were desirous that voting by ballot should be made a part
of the electoral law, it was decided that an independent motion
should be brought on in anticipation of Mr. Mildmay's bill. The
arrangement was probably one of Mr. Mildmay's own making; so that
he might be hampered by no opposition on that subject by his own
followers if,--as he did not doubt,--the motion should be lost.
It was expected that the debate would not last over one night,
and Phineas resolved that he would make his maiden speech on this
occasion. He had very strong opinions as to the inefficacy of the
ballot for any good purposes, and thought that he might be able to
strike out from his convictions some sparks of that fire which used
to be so plentiful with him at the old debating clubs. But even at
breakfast that morning his heart began to beat quickly at the idea
of having to stand on his legs before so critical an audience.
He knew that it would be well that he should if possible get the
subject off his mind during the day, and therefore went out among the
people who certainly would not talk to him about the ballot. He sat
for nearly an hour in the morning with Mr. Low, and did not even tell
Mr. Low that it was his intention to speak on that day. Then he made
one or two other calls, and at about three went up to Portman Square
to look for Lord Chiltern. It was now nearly the end of February, and
Phineas had often seen Lady Laura. He had not seen her brother, but
had learned from his sister that he had been driven up to London by
the frost, He was told by the porter at Lord Brentford's that Lord
Chiltern was in the house, and as he was passing through the hall he
met Lord Brentford himself. He was thus driven to speak, and felt
himself called upon to explain why he was there. "I am come to see
Lord Chiltern," he said.
"Is Lord Chiltern in the house?" said the Earl, turning to the
servant.
"Yes, my lord; his lordship arrived last night."
"You will find him upstairs, I suppose," said the Earl. "For myself
I know nothing of him." He spoke in an angry tone, as though he
resented the fact that any one should come to his house to call upon
his son; and turned his back quickly upon Phineas. But he thought
better of it before he reached the front door, and turned again.
"By-the-bye," said he, "what majority shall we have to-night, Finn?"
"Pretty nearly as many as you please to name, my lord," said Phineas.
"Well;--yes; I suppose we are tolerably safe. You ought to speak upon
it."
"Perhaps I may," said Phineas, feeling that he blushed as he spoke.
"Do," said the Earl. "Do. If you see Lord Chiltern will you tell him
from me that I should be glad to see him before he leaves London. I
shall be at home till noon to-morrow." Phineas, much astonished at
the commission given to him, of course said that he would do as he
was desired, and then passed on to Lord Chiltern's apartments.
He found his friend standing in the middle of the room, without coat
and waistcoat, with a pair of dumb-bells in his hands. "When there's
no hunting I'm driven to this kind of thing," said Lord Chiltern.
"I suppose it's good exercise," said Phineas.
"And it gives me something to do. When I'm in London I feel like a
gipsy in church, till the time comes for prowling out at night. I've
no occupation for my days whatever, and no place to which I can take
myself. I can't stand in a club window as some men do, and I should
disgrace any decent club if I did stand there. I belong to the
Travellers, but I doubt whether the porter would let me go in."
"I think you pique yourself on being more of an outer Bohemian than
you are," said Phineas.
"I pique myself on this, that whether Bohemian or not, I will go
nowhere that I am not wanted. Though,--for the matter of that, I
suppose I'm not wanted here." Then Phineas gave him the message from
his father. "He wishes to see me to-morrow morning?" continued Lord
Chiltern. "Let him send me word what it is he has to say to me. I do
not choose to be insulted by him, though he is my father."
"I would certainly go, if I were you."
"I doubt it very much, if all the circumstances were the same. Let
him tell me what he wants."
"Of course I cannot ask him, Chiltern."
"I know what he wants very well. Laura has been interfering and doing
no good. You know Violet Effingham?"
"Yes; I know her," said Phineas, much surprised.
"They want her to marry me."
"And you do not wish to marry her?"
"I did not say that. But do you think that such a girl as Miss
Effingham would marry such a man as I am? She would be much more
likely to take you. By George, she would! Do you know that she has
three thousand a year of her own?"
"I know that she has money."
"That's about the tune of it. I would take her without a shilling
to-morrow, if she would have me,--because I like her. She is the only
girl I ever did like. But what is the use of my liking her? They have
painted me so black among them, especially my father, that no decent
girl would think of marrying me."
"Your father can't be angry with you if you do your best to comply
with his wishes."
"I don't care a straw whether he be angry or not. He allows me eight
hundred a year, and he knows that if he stopped it I should go to the
Jews the next day. I could not help myself. He can't leave an acre
away from me, and yet he won't join me in raising money for the sake
of paying Laura her fortune."
"Lady Laura can hardly want money now."
"That detestable prig whom she has chosen to marry, and whom I
hate with all my heart, is richer than ever Croesus was; but
nevertheless Laura ought to have her own money. She shall have it
some day."
"I would see Lord Brentford, if I were you."
"I will think about it. Now tell me about coming down to Willingford.
Laura says you will come some day in March. I can mount you for a
couple of days and should be delighted to have you. My horses all
pull like the mischief, and rush like devils, and want a deal of
riding; but an Irishman likes that."
"I do not dislike it particularly."
"I like it. I prefer to have something to do on horseback. When
a man tells me that a horse is an armchair, I always tell him to
put the brute into his bedroom. Mind you come. The house I stay
at is called the Willingford Bull, and it's just four miles from
Peterborough." Phineas swore that he would go down and ride the
pulling horses, and then took his leave, earnestly advising Lord
Chiltern, as he went, to keep the appointment proposed by his father.
When the morning came, at half-past eleven, the son, who had been
standing for half an hour with his back to the fire in the large
gloomy dining-room, suddenly rang the bell. "Tell the Earl," he said
to the servant, "that I am here and will go to him if he wishes it."
The servant came back, and said that the Earl was waiting. Then Lord
Chiltern strode after the man into his father's room.
"Oswald," said the father, "I have sent for you because I think it
may be as well to speak to you on some business. Will you sit down?"
Lord Chiltern sat down, but did not answer a word. "I feel very
unhappy about your sister's fortune," said the Earl.
"So do I,--very unhappy. We can raise the money between us, and pay
her to-morrow, if you please it."
"It was in opposition to my advice that she paid your debts."
"And in opposition to mine too."
"I told her that I would not pay them, and were I to give her back
to-morrow, as you say, the money that she has so used, I should be
stultifying myself. But I will do so on one condition. I will join
with you in raising the money for your sister, on one condition."
"What is that?"
"Laura tells me,--indeed she has told me often,--that you are
attached to Violet Effingham."
"But Violet Effingham, my lord, is unhappily not attached to me."
"I do not know how that may be. Of course I cannot say. I have never
taken the liberty of interrogating her upon the subject."
"Even you, my lord, could hardly have done that."
"What do you mean by that? I say that I never have," said the Earl,
angrily.
"I simply mean that even you could hardly have asked Miss Effingham
such a question. I have asked her, and she has refused me."
"But girls often do that, and yet accept afterwards the men whom they
have refused. Laura tells me that she believes that Violet would
consent if you pressed your suit."
"Laura knows nothing about it, my lord."
"There you are probably wrong. Laura and Violet are very close
friends, and have no doubt discussed this matter between them. At any
rate, it may be as well that you should hear what I have to say. Of
course I shall not interfere myself. There is no ground on which I
can do so with propriety."
"None whatever," said Lord Chiltern.
The Earl became very angry, and nearly broke down in his anger. He
paused for a moment, feeling disposed to tell his son to go and never
to see him again. But he gulped down his wrath, and went on with his
speech. "My meaning, sir, is this;--that I have so great faith in
Violet Effingham, that I would receive her acceptance of your hand as
the only proof which would be convincing to me of amendment in your
mode of life. If she were to do so, I would join with you in raising
money to pay your sister, would make some further sacrifice with
reference to an income for you and your wife, and--would make you
both welcome to Saulsby,--if you chose to come." The Earl's voice
hesitated much and became almost tremulous as he made the last
proposition. And his eyes had fallen away from his son's gaze, and
he had bent a little over the table, and was moved. But he recovered
himself at once, and added, with all proper dignity, "If you have
anything to say I shall be glad to hear it."
"All your offers would be nothing, my lord, if I did not like the
girl."
"I should not ask you to marry a girl if you did not like her, as you
call it."
"But as to Miss Effingham, it happens that our wishes jump together.
I have asked her, and she has refused me. I don't even know where
to find her to ask her again. If I went to Lady Baldock's house the
servants would not let me in."
"And whose fault is that?"
"Yours partly, my lord. You have told everybody that I am the devil,
and now all the old women believe it."
"I never told anybody so."
"I'll tell you what I'll do. I will go down to Lady Baldock's to-day.
I suppose she is at Baddingham. And if I can get speech of Miss
Effingham--"
"Miss Effingham is not at Baddingham. Miss Effingham is staying with
your sister in Grosvenor Place. I saw her yesterday."
"She is in London?"
"I tell you that I saw her yesterday."
"Very well, my lord. Then I will do the best I can. Laura will tell
you of the result."
The father would have given the son some advice as to the mode in
which he should put forward his claim upon Violet's hand, but the son
would not wait to hear it. Choosing to presume that the conference
was over, he went back to the room in which he had kept his
dumb-bells, and for a minute or two went to work at his favourite
exercise. But he soon put the dumb-bells down, and began to prepare
himself for his work. If this thing was to be done, it might as
well be done at once. He looked out of his window, and saw that the
streets were in a mess of slush. White snow was becoming black mud,
as it will do in London; and the violence of frost was giving way to
the horrors of thaw. All would be soft and comparatively pleasant in
Northamptonshire on the following morning, and if everything went
right he would breakfast at the Willingford Bull. He would go down by
the hunting train, and be at the inn by ten. The meet was only six
miles distant, and all would be pleasant. He would do this whatever
might be the result of his work to-day;--but in the meantime he would
go and do his work. He had a cab called, and within half an hour of
the time at which he had left his father, he was at the door of his
sister's house in Grosvenor Place. The servants told him that the
ladies were at lunch. "I can't eat lunch," he said. "Tell them that I
am in the drawing-room."
"He has come to see you," said Lady Laura, as soon as the servant had
left the room.
"I hope not," said Violet.
"Do not say that."
"But I do say it. I hope he has not come to see me;--that is, not to
see me specially. Of course I cannot pretend not to know what you
mean."
"He may think it civil to call if he has heard that you are in town,"
said Lady Laura, after a pause.
"If it be only that, I will be civil in return;--as sweet as May to
him. If it be really only that, and if I were sure of it, I should
be really glad to see him." Then they finished their lunch, and Lady
Laura got up and led the way to the drawing-room.
"I hope you remember," said she, gravely, "that you might be a
saviour to him."
"I do not believe in girls being saviours to men. It is the man who
should be the saviour to the girl. If I marry at all, I have the
right to expect that protection shall be given to me,--not that I
shall have to give it."
"Violet, you are determined to misrepresent what I mean."
Lord Chiltern was walking about the room, and did not sit down when
they entered. The ordinary greetings took place, and Miss Effingham
made some remark about the frost. "But it seems to be going," she
said, "and I suppose that you will soon be at work again?"
"Yes;--I shall hunt to-morrow," said Lord Chiltern.
"And the next day, and the next, and the next," said Violet, "till
about the middle of April;--and then your period of misery will
begin!"
"Exactly," said Lord Chiltern. "I have nothing but hunting that I can
call an occupation."
"Why don't you make one?" said his sister.
"I mean to do so, if it be possible. Laura, would you mind leaving me
and Miss Effingham alone for a few minutes?"
Lady Laura got up, and so also did Miss Effingham. "For what
purpose?" said the latter. "It cannot be for any good purpose."
"At any rate I wish it, and I will not harm you." Lady Laura was now
going, but paused before she reached the door. "Laura, will you do as
I ask you?" said the brother. Then Lady Laura went.
"It was not that I feared you would harm me, Lord Chiltern," said
Violet.
"No;--I know it was not. But what I say is always said awkwardly. An
hour ago I did not know that you were in town, but when I was told
the news I came at once. My father told me."
"I am so glad that you see your father."
"I have not spoken to him for months before, and probably may not
speak to him for months again. But there is one point, Violet, on
which he and I agree."
"I hope there will soon be many."
"It is possible,--but I fear not probable. Look here, Violet,"--and
he looked at her with all his eyes, till it seemed to her that he was
all eyes, so great was the intensity of his gaze;--"I should scorn
myself were I to permit myself to come before you with a plea for
your favour founded on my father's whims. My father is unreasonable,
and has been very unjust to me. He has ever believed evil of me, and
has believed it often when all the world knew that he was wrong. I
care little for being reconciled to a father who has been so cruel to
me."
"He loves me dearly, and is my friend. I would rather that you should
not speak against him to me."
"You will understand, at least, that I am asking nothing from you
because he wishes it. Laura probably has told you that you may make
things straight by becoming my wife."
"She has,--certainly, Lord Chiltern."
"It is an argument that she should never have used. It is an argument
to which you should not listen for a moment. Make things straight
indeed! Who can tell? There would be very little made straight by
such a marriage, if it were not that I loved you. Violet, that is
my plea, and my only one. I love you so well that I do believe that
if you took me I should return to the old ways, and become as other
men are, and be in time as respectable, as stupid,--and perhaps as
ill-natured as old Lady Baldock herself."
"My poor aunt!"
"You know she says worse things of me than that. Now, dearest, you
have heard all that I have to say to you." As he spoke he came close
to her, and put out his hand,--but she did not touch it. "I have no
other argument to use,--not a word more to say. As I came here in
the cab I was turning it over in my mind that I might find what best
I should say. But, after all, there is nothing more to be said than
that."
"The words make no difference," she replied.
"Not unless they be so uttered as to force a belief. I do love you. I
know no other reason but that why you should be my wife. I have no
other excuse to offer for coming to you again. You are the one thing
in the world that to me has any charm. Can you be surprised that I
should be persistent in asking for it?" He was looking at her still
with the same gaze, and there seemed to be a power in his eye from
which she could not escape. He was still standing with his right hand
out, as though expecting, or at least hoping, that her hand might be
put into his.
"How am I to answer you?" she said.
"With your love, if you can give it to me. Do you remember how you
swore once that you would love me for ever and always?"
"You should not remind me of that. I was a child then,--a naughty
child," she added, smiling; "and was put to bed for what I did on
that day."
"Be a child still."
"Ah, if we but could!"
"And have you no other answer to make me?"
"Of course I must answer you. You are entitled to an answer. Lord
Chiltern, I am sorry that I cannot give you the love for which you
ask."
"Never?"
"Never."
"Is it myself personally, or what you have heard of me, that is so
hateful to you?"
"Nothing is hateful to me. I have never spoken of hate. I shall
always feel the strongest regard for my old friend and playfellow.
But there are many things which a woman is bound to consider before
she allows herself so to love a man that she can consent to become
his wife."
"Allow herself! Then it is a matter entirely of calculation."
"I suppose there should be some thought in it, Lord Chiltern."
There was now a pause, and the man's hand was at last allowed to
drop, as there came no response to the proffered grasp. He walked
once or twice across the room before he spoke again, and then he
stopped himself closely opposite to her.
"I shall never try again," he said.
"It will be better so," she replied.
"There is something to me unmanly in a man's persecuting a girl. Just
tell Laura, will you, that it is all over; and she may as well tell
my father. Good-bye."
She then tendered her hand to him, but he did not take it,--probably
did not see it, and at once left the room and the house.
"And yet I believe you love him," Lady Laura said to her friend
in her anger, when they discussed the matter immediately on Lord
Chiltern's departure.
"You have no right to say that, Laura."
"I have a right to my belief, and I do believe it. I think you love
him, and that you lack the courage to risk yourself in trying to save
him."
"Is a woman bound to marry a man if she love him?"
"Yes, she is," replied Lady Laura impetuously, without thinking of
what she was saying; "that is, if she be convinced that she also is
loved."
"Whatever be the man's character;--whatever be the circumstances?
Must she do so, whatever friends may say to the contrary? Is there to
be no prudence in marriage?"
"There may be a great deal too much prudence," said Lady Laura.
"That is true. There is certainly too much prudence if a woman
marries prudently, but without love." Violet intended by this no
attack upon her friend,--had not had present in her mind at the
moment any idea of Lady Laura's special prudence in marrying Mr.
Kennedy; but Lady Laura felt it keenly, and knew at once that an
arrow had been shot which had wounded her.
"We shall get nothing," she said, "by descending to personalities
with each other."
"I meant none, Laura."
"I suppose it is always hard," said Lady Laura, "for any one person
to judge altogether of the mind of another. If I have said anything
severe of your refusal of my brother, I retract it. I only wish that
it could have been otherwise."
Lord Chiltern, when he left his sister's house, walked through the
slush and dirt to a haunt of his in the neighbourhood of Covent
Garden, and there he remained through the whole afternoon and
evening. A certain Captain Clutterbuck joined him, and dined with
him. He told nothing to Captain Clutterbuck of his sorrow, but
Captain Clutterbuck could see that he was unhappy.
"Let's have another bottle of 'cham,'" said Captain Clutterbuck, when
their dinner was nearly over. "'Cham' is the only thing to screw one
up when one is down a peg."
"You can have what you like," said Lord Chiltern; "but I shall have
some brandy-and-water."
"The worst of brandy-and-water is, that one gets tired of it before
the night is over," said Captain Clutterbuck.
Nevertheless, Lord Chiltern did go down to Peterborough the next day
by the hunting train, and rode his horse Bonebreaker so well in that
famous run from Sutton springs to Gidding that after the run young
Piles,--of the house of Piles, Sarsnet, and Gingham,--offered him
three hundred pounds for the animal.
"He isn't worth above fifty," said Lord Chiltern.
"But I'll give you the three hundred," said Piles.
"You couldn't ride him if you'd got him," said Lord Chiltern.
"Oh, couldn't I!" said Piles. But Mr. Piles did not continue the
conversation, contenting himself with telling his friend Grogram that
that red devil Chiltern was as drunk as a lord.
CHAPTER XX
The Debate on the Ballot
Phineas took his seat in the House with a consciousness of much
inward trepidation of heart on that night of the ballot debate. After
leaving Lord Chiltern he went down to his club and dined alone. Three
or four men came and spoke to him; but he could not talk to them at
his ease, nor did he quite know what they were saying to him. He
was going to do something which he longed to achieve, but the very
idea of which, now that it was so near to him, was a terror to him.
To be in the House and not to speak would, to his thinking, be a
disgraceful failure. Indeed, he could not continue to keep his seat
unless he spoke. He had been put there that he might speak. He would
speak. Of course he would speak. Had he not already been conspicuous
almost as a boy orator? And yet, at this moment he did not know
whether he was eating mutton or beef, or who was standing opposite to
him and talking to him, so much was he in dread of the ordeal which
he had prepared for himself. As he went down to the House after
dinner, he almost made up his mind that it would be a good thing to
leave London by one of the night mail trains. He felt himself to be
stiff and stilted as he walked, and that his clothes were uneasy to
him. When he turned into Westminster Hall he regretted more keenly
than ever he had done that he had seceded from the keeping of Mr.
Low. He could, he thought, have spoken very well in court, and would
there have learned that self-confidence which now failed him so
terribly. It was, however, too late to think of that. He could only
go in and take his seat.
He went in and took his seat, and the chamber seemed to him to be
mysteriously large, as though benches were crowded over benches, and
galleries over galleries. He had been long enough in the House to
have lost the original awe inspired by the Speaker and the clerks of
the House, by the row of Ministers, and by the unequalled importance
of the place. On ordinary occasions he could saunter in and out, and
whisper at his ease to a neighbour. But on this occasion he went
direct to the bench on which he ordinarily sat, and began at once to
rehearse to himself his speech. He had in truth been doing this all
day, in spite of the effort that he had made to rid himself of all
memory of the occasion. He had been collecting the heads of his
speech while Mr. Low had been talking to him, and refreshing his
quotations in the presence of Lord Chiltern and the dumb-bells. He
had taxed his memory and his intellect with various tasks, which,
as he feared, would not adjust themselves one with another. He had
learned the headings of his speech,--so that one heading might follow
the other, and nothing be forgotten. And he had learned verbatim the
words which he intended to utter under each heading,--with a hope
that if any one compact part should be destroyed or injured in its
compactness by treachery of memory, or by the course of the debate,
each other compact part might be there in its entirety, ready for
use;--or at least so many of the compact parts as treachery of
memory and the accidents of the debate might leave to him; so
that his speech might be like a vessel, watertight in its various
compartments, that would float by the buoyancy of its stern and bow,
even though the hold should be waterlogged. But this use of his
composed words, even though he should be able to carry it through,
would not complete his work;--for it would be his duty to answer in
some sort those who had gone before him, and in order to do this he
must be able to insert, without any prearrangement of words or ideas,
little intercalatory parts between those compact masses of argument
with which he had been occupying himself for many laborious hours. As
he looked round upon the House and perceived that everything was dim
before him, that all his original awe of the House had returned, and
with it a present quaking fear that made him feel the pulsations
of his own heart, he became painfully aware that the task he had
prepared for himself was too great. He should, on this the occasion
of his rising to his maiden legs, have either prepared for himself
a short general speech, which could indeed have done little for his
credit in the House, but which might have served to carry off the
novelty of the thing, and have introduced him to the sound of his own
voice within those walls,--or he should have trusted to what his wit
and spirit would produce for him on the spur of the moment, and not
have burdened himself with a huge exercise of memory. During the
presentation of a few petitions he tried to repeat to himself the
first of his compact parts,--a compact part on which, as it might
certainly be brought into use let the debate have gone as it might,
he had expended great care. He had flattered himself that there
was something of real strength in his words as he repeated them to
himself in the comfortable seclusion of his own room, and he had made
them so ready to his tongue that he thought it to be impossible that
he should forget even an intonation. Now he found that he could not
remember the first phrases without unloosing and looking at a small
roll of paper which he held furtively in his hand. What was the good
of looking at it? He would forget it again in the next moment. He had
intended to satisfy the most eager of his friends, and to astound his
opponents. As it was, no one would be satisfied,--and none astounded
but they who had trusted in him.
The debate began, and if the leisure afforded by a long and tedious
speech could have served him, he might have had leisure enough. He
tried at first to follow all that this advocate for the ballot might
say, hoping thence to acquire the impetus of strong interest; but he
soon wearied of the work, and began to long that the speech might
be ended, although the period of his own martyrdom would thereby
be brought nearer to him. At half-past seven so many members had
deserted their seats, that Phineas began to think that he might be
saved all further pains by a "count out." He reckoned the members
present and found that they were below the mystic forty,--first by
two, then by four, by five, by seven, and at one time by eleven.
It was not for him to ask the Speaker to count the House, but he
wondered that no one else should do so. And yet, as the idea of this
termination to the night's work came upon him, and as he thought of
his lost labour, he almost took courage again,--almost dreaded rather
than wished for the interference of some malicious member. But there
was no malicious member then present, or else it was known that Lords
of the Treasury and Lords of the Admiralty would flock in during
the Speaker's ponderous counting,--and thus the slow length of the
ballot-lover's verbosity was permitted to evolve itself without
interruption. At eight o'clock he had completed his catalogue of
illustrations, and immediately Mr. Monk rose from the Treasury bench
to explain the grounds on which the Government must decline to
support the motion before the House.
Phineas was aware that Mr. Monk intended to speak, and was aware also
that his speech would be very short. "My idea is," he had said to
Phineas, "that every man possessed of the franchise should dare to
have and to express a political opinion of his own; that otherwise
the franchise is not worth having; and that men will learn that when
all so dare, no evil can come from such daring. As the ballot would
make any courage of that kind unnecessary, I dislike the ballot. I
shall confine myself to that, and leave the illustration to younger
debaters." Phineas also had been informed that Mr. Turnbull would
reply to Mr. Monk, with the purpose of crushing Mr. Monk into dust,
and Phineas had prepared his speech with something of an intention of
subsequently crushing Mr. Turnbull. He knew, however, that he could
not command his opportunity. There was the chapter of accidents to
which he must accommodate himself; but such had been his programme
for the evening.
Mr. Monk made his speech,--and though he was short, he was very fiery
and energetic. Quick as lightning words of wrath and scorn flew from
him, in which he painted the cowardice, the meanness, the falsehood
of the ballot. "The ballot-box," he said, "was the grave of all true
political opinion." Though he spoke hardly for ten minutes, he seemed
to say more than enough, ten times enough, to slaughter the argument
of the former speaker. At every hot word as it fell Phineas was
driven to regret that a paragraph of his own was taken away from him,
and that his choicest morsels of standing ground were being cut from
under his feet. When Mr. Monk sat down, Phineas felt that Mr. Monk
had said all that he, Phineas Finn, had intended to say.
Then Mr. Turnbull rose slowly from the bench below the gangway. With
a speaker so frequent and so famous as Mr. Turnbull no hurry is
necessary. He is sure to have his opportunity. The Speaker's eye is
ever travelling to the accustomed spots. Mr. Turnbull rose slowly and
began his oration very mildly. "There was nothing," he said, "that he
admired so much as the poetic imagery and the high-flown sentiment
of his right honourable friend the member for West Bromwich,"--Mr.
Monk sat for West Bromwich,--"unless it were the stubborn facts and
unanswered arguments of his honourable friend who had brought forward
this motion." Then Mr. Turnbull proceeded after his fashion to crush
Mr. Monk. He was very prosaic, very clear both in voice and language,
very harsh, and very unscrupulous. He and Mr. Monk had been joined
together in politics for over twenty years;--but one would have
thought, from Mr. Turnbull's words, that they had been the bitterest
of enemies. Mr. Monk was taunted with his office, taunted with his
desertion of the liberal party, taunted with his ambition,--and
taunted with his lack of ambition. "I once thought," said Mr.
Turnbull,--"nay, not long ago I thought, that he and I would have
fought this battle for the people, shoulder to shoulder, and knee to
knee;--but he has preferred that the knee next to his own shall wear
a garter, and that the shoulder which supports him shall be decked
with a blue ribbon,--as shoulders, I presume, are decked in those
closet conferences which are called Cabinets."
Just after this, while Mr. Turnbull was still going on with a variety
of illustrations drawn from the United States, Barrington Erle
stepped across the benches up to the place where Phineas was sitting,
and whispered a few words into his ear. "Bonteen is prepared to
answer Turnbull, and wishes to do it. I told him that I thought you
should have the opportunity, if you wish it." Phineas was not ready
with a reply to Erle at the spur of the moment. "Somebody told
me," continued Erle, "that you had said that you would like to speak
to-night."
"So I did," said Phineas.
"Shall I tell Bonteen that you will do it?"
The chamber seemed to swim round before our hero's eyes. Mr. Turnbull
was still going on with his clear, loud, unpleasant voice, but there
was no knowing how long he might go on. Upon Phineas, if he should
now consent, might devolve the duty, within ten minutes, within three
minutes, of rising there before a full House to defend his great
friend, Mr. Monk, from a gross personal attack. Was it fit that
such a novice as he should undertake such a work as that? Were he
to do so, all that speech which he had prepared, with its various
self-floating parts, must go for nothing. The task was exactly that
which, of all tasks, he would best like to have accomplished, and
to have accomplished well. But if he should fail! And he felt that
he would fail. For such work a man should have all his senses
about him,--his full courage, perfect confidence, something almost
approaching to contempt for listening opponents, and nothing of fear
in regard to listening friends. He should be as a cock in his own
farmyard, master of all the circumstances around him. But Phineas
Finn had not even as yet heard the sound of his own voice in that
room. At this moment, so confused was he, that he did not know where
sat Mr. Mildmay, and where Mr. Daubeny. All was confused, and there
arose as it were a sound of waters in his ears, and a feeling as of a
great hell around him. "I had rather wait," he said at last. "Bonteen
had better reply." Barrington Erle looked into his face, and then
stepping back across the benches, told Mr. Bonteen that the
opportunity was his.
Mr. Turnbull continued speaking quite long enough to give poor
Phineas time for repentance; but repentance was of no use. He had
decided against himself, and his decision could not be reversed. He
would have left the House, only it seemed to him that had he done so
every one would look at him. He drew his hat down over his eyes, and
remained in his place, hating Mr. Bonteen, hating Barrington Erle,
hating Mr. Turnbull,--but hating no one so much as he hated himself.
He had disgraced himself for ever and could never recover the
occasion which he had lost.
Mr. Bonteen's speech was in no way remarkable. Mr. Monk, he said, had
done the State good service by adding his wisdom and patriotism to
the Cabinet. The sort of argument which Mr. Bonteen used to prove
that a man who has gained credit as a legislator should in process of
time become a member of the executive, is trite and common, and was
not used by Mr. Bonteen with any special force. Mr. Bonteen was glib
of tongue and possessed that familiarity with the place which poor
Phineas had lacked so sorely. There was one moment, however, which
was terrible to Phineas. As soon as Mr. Bonteen had shown the purpose
for which he was on his legs, Mr. Monk looked round at Phineas, as
though in reproach. He had expected that this work should fall into
the hands of one who would perform it with more warmth of heart than
could be expected from Mr. Bonteen. When Mr. Bonteen ceased, two or
three other short speeches were made and members fired off their
little guns. Phineas having lost so great an opportunity, would not
now consent to accept one that should be comparatively valueless.
Then there came a division. The motion was lost by a large
majority,--by any number you might choose to name, as Phineas had
said to Lord Brentford; but in that there was no triumph to the poor
wretch who had failed through fear, and who was now a coward in his
own esteem.
He left the House alone, carefully avoiding all speech with any one.
As he came out he had seen Laurence Fitzgibbon in the lobby, but he
had gone on without pausing a moment, so that he might avoid his
friend. And when he was out in Palace Yard, where was he to go next?
He looked at his watch, and found that it was just ten. He did not
dare to go to his club, and it was impossible for him to go home and
to bed. He was very miserable, and nothing would comfort him but
sympathy. Was there any one who would listen to his abuse of himself,
and would then answer him with kindly apologies for his own weakness?
Mrs. Bunce would do it if she knew how, but sympathy from Mrs. Bunce
would hardly avail. There was but one person in the world to whom he
could tell his own humiliation with any hope of comfort, and that
person was Lady Laura Kennedy. Sympathy from any man would have been
distasteful to him. He had thought for a moment of flinging himself
at Mr. Monk's feet and telling all his weakness;--but he could not
have endured pity even from Mr. Monk. It was not to be endured from
any man.
He thought that Lady Laura Kennedy would be at home, and probably
alone. He knew, at any rate, that he might be allowed to knock at her
door, even at that hour. He had left Mr. Kennedy in the House, and
there he would probably remain for the next hour. There was no man
more constant than Mr. Kennedy in seeing the work of the day,--or of
the night,--to its end. So Phineas walked up Victoria Street, and
from thence into Grosvenor Place, and knocked at Lady Laura's door.
"Yes; Lady Laura was at home; and alone." He was shown up into the
drawing-room, and there he found Lady Laura waiting for her husband.
"So the great debate is over," she said, with as much of irony as she
knew how to throw into the epithet.
"Yes; it is over."
"And what have they done,--those leviathans of the people?"
Then Phineas told her what was the majority.
"Is there anything the matter with you, Mr. Finn?" she said, looking
at him suddenly. "Are you not well?"
"Yes; I am very well."
"Will you not sit down? There is something wrong, I know. What is
it?"
"I have simply been the greatest idiot, the greatest coward, the most
awkward ass that ever lived!"
"What do you mean?"
"I do not know why I should come to tell you of it at this hour at
night, but I have come that I might tell you. Probably because there
is no one else in the whole world who would not laugh at me."
"At any rate, I shall not laugh at you," said Lady Laura.
"But you will despise me."
"That I am sure I shall not do."
"You cannot help it. I despise myself. For years I have placed before
myself the ambition of speaking in the House of Commons;--for years I
have been thinking whether there would ever come to me an opportunity
of making myself heard in that assembly, which I consider to be
the first in the world. To-day the opportunity has been offered to
me,--and, though the motion was nothing, the opportunity was great.
The subject was one on which I was thoroughly prepared. The manner
in which I was summoned was most flattering to me. I was especially
called on to perform a task which was most congenial to my
feelings;--and I declined because I was afraid."
"You had thought too much about it, my friend," said Lady Laura.
"Too much or too little, what does it matter?" replied Phineas, in
despair. "There is the fact. I could not do it. Do you remember the
story of Conachar in the 'Fair Maid of Perth;'--how his heart refused
to give him blood enough to fight? He had been suckled with the milk
of a timid creature, and, though he could die, there was none of the
strength of manhood in him. It is about the same thing with me, I
take it."
"I do not think you are at all like Conachar," said Lady Laura.
"I am equally disgraced, and I must perish after the same fashion. I
shall apply for the Chiltern Hundreds in a day or two."
"You will do nothing of the kind," said Lady Laura, getting up from
her chair and coming towards him. "You shall not leave this room till
you have promised me that you will do nothing of the kind. I do not
know as yet what has occurred to-night; but I do know that that
modesty which has kept you silent is more often a grace than a
disgrace."
This was the kind of sympathy which he wanted, She drew her chair
nearer to him, and then he explained to her as accurately as he could
what had taken place in the House on this evening,--how he had
prepared his speech, how he had felt that his preparation was vain,
how he perceived from the course of the debate that if he spoke
at all his speech must be very different from what he had first
intended; how he had declined to take upon himself a task which
seemed to require so close a knowledge of the ways of the House and
of the temper of the men, as the defence of such a man as Mr. Monk.
In accusing himself he, unconsciously, excused himself, and his
excuse, in Lady Laura's ears, was more valid than his accusation.
"And you would give it all up for that?" she said.
"Yes; I think I ought."
"I have very little doubt but that you were right in allowing Mr.
Bonteen to undertake such a task. I should simply explain to Mr. Monk
that you felt too keen an interest in his welfare to stand up as an
untried member in his defence. It is not, I think, the work for a man
who is not at home in the House. I am sure Mr. Monk will feel this,
and I am quite certain that Mr. Kennedy will think that you have been
right."
"I do not care what Mr. Kennedy may think."
"Why do you say that, Mr. Finn? That is not courteous."
"Simply because I care so much what Mr. Kennedy's wife may think.
Your opinion is all in all to me,--only that I know you are too kind
to me."
"He would not be too kind to you. He is never too kind to any one. He
is justice itself."
Phineas, as he heard the tones of her voice, could not but feel that
there was in Lady Laura's words something of an accusation against
her husband.
"I hate justice," said Phineas. "I know that justice would condemn
me. But love and friendship know nothing of justice. The value of
love is that it overlooks faults, and forgives even crimes."
"I, at any rate," said Lady Laura, "will forgive the crime of your
silence in the House. My strong belief in your success will not be in
the least affected by what you tell me of your failure to-night. You
must await another opportunity; and, if possible, you should be less
anxious as to your own performance. There is Violet." As Lady Laura
spoke the last words, there was a sound of a carriage stopping in the
street, and the front door was immediately opened. "She is staying
here, but has been dining with her uncle, Admiral Effingham." Then
Violet Effingham entered the room, rolled up in pretty white furs,
and silk cloaks, and lace shawls. "Here is Mr. Finn, come to tell us
of the debate about the ballot."
"I don't care twopence about the ballot," said Violet, as she put out
her hand to Phineas. "Are we going to have a new iron fleet built?
That's the question."
"Sir Simeon has come out strong to-night," said Lady Laura.
"There is no political question of any importance except the question
of the iron fleet," said Violet. "I am quite sure of that, and so, if
Mr. Finn can tell me nothing about the iron fleet, I'll go to bed."
"Mr. Kennedy will tell you everything when he comes home," said
Phineas.
"Oh, Mr. Kennedy! Mr. Kennedy never tells one anything. I doubt
whether Mr. Kennedy thinks that any woman knows the meaning of the
British Constitution."
"Do you know what it means, Violet?" asked Lady Laura.
"To be sure I do. It is liberty to growl about the iron fleet, or
the ballot, or the taxes, or the peers, or the bishops,--or anything
else, except the House of Commons. That's the British Constitution.
Good-night, Mr. Finn."
"What a beautiful creature she is!" said Phineas.
"Yes, indeed," said Lady Laura.
"And full of wit and grace and pleasantness. I do not wonder at your
brother's choice."
It will be remembered that this was said on the day before Lord
Chiltern had made his offer for the third time.
"Poor Oswald! he does not know as yet that she is in town."
After that Phineas went, not wishing to await the return of Mr.
Kennedy. He had felt that Violet Effingham had come into the room
just in time to remedy a great difficulty. He did not wish to speak
of his love to a married woman,--to the wife of the man who called
him friend,--to a woman who he felt sure would have rebuked him. But
he could hardly have restrained himself had not Miss Effingham been
there.
But as he went home he thought more of Miss Effingham than he did of
Lady Laura; and I think that the voice of Miss Effingham had done
almost as much towards comforting him as had the kindness of the
other.
At any rate, he had been comforted.
CHAPTER XXI
"Do be punctual"
On the very morning after his failure in the House of Commons, when
Phineas was reading in the _Telegraph_,--he took the _Telegraph_ not
from choice but for economy,--the words of that debate which he had
heard and in which he should have taken a part, a most unwelcome
visit was paid to him. It was near eleven, and the breakfast things
were still on the table. He was at this time on a Committee of the
House with reference to the use of potted peas in the army and
navy, at which he had sat once,--at a preliminary meeting,--and in
reference to which he had already resolved that as he had failed so
frightfully in debate, he would certainly do his duty to the utmost
in the more easy but infinitely more tedious work of the Committee
Room. The Committee met at twelve, and he intended to walk down to
the Reform Club, and then to the House. He had just completed his
reading of the debate and of the leaders in the _Telegraph_ on the
subject. He had told himself how little the writer of the article
knew about Mr. Turnbull, how little about Mr. Monk, and how little
about the people,--such being his own ideas as to the qualifications
of the writer of that leading article,--and was about to start. But
Mrs. Bunce arrested him by telling him that there was a man below who
wanted to see him.
"What sort of a man, Mrs. Bunce?"
"He ain't a gentleman, sir."
"Did he give his name?"
"He did not, sir; but I know it's about money. I know the ways of
them so well. I've seen this one's face before somewhere."
"You had better show him up," said Phineas. He knew well the business
on which the man was come. The man wanted money for that bill which
Laurence Fitzgibbon had sent afloat, and which Phineas had endorsed.
Phineas had never as yet fallen so deeply into troubles of money as
to make it necessary that he need refuse himself to any callers on
that score, and he did not choose to do so now. Nevertheless he most
heartily wished that he had left his lodgings for the club before the
man had come. This was not the first he had heard of the bill being
overdue and unpaid. The bill had been brought to him noted a month
since, and then he had simply told the youth who brought it that he
would see Mr. Fitzgibbon and have the matter settled. He had spoken
to his friend Laurence, and Laurence had simply assured him that all
should be made right in two days,--or, at furthest, by the end of
a week. Since that time he had observed that his friend had been
somewhat shy of speaking to him when no others were with them.
Phineas would not have alluded to the bill had he and Laurence been
alone together; but he had been quick enough to guess from his
friend's manner that the matter was not settled. Now, no doubt,
serious trouble was about to commence.
The visitor was a little man with grey hair and a white cravat, some
sixty years of age, dressed in black, with a very decent hat,--which,
on entering the room, he at once put down on the nearest chair,--with
reference to whom, any judge on the subject would have concurred at
first sight in the decision pronounced by Mrs. Bunce, though none
but a judge very well used to sift the causes of his own conclusions
could have given the reasons for that early decision. "He ain't a
gentleman," Mrs. Bunce had said. And the man certainly was not a
gentleman. The old man in the white cravat was very neatly dressed,
and carried himself without any of that humility which betrays one
class of uncertified aspirants to gentility, or of that assumed
arrogance which is at once fatal to another class. But, nevertheless,
Mrs. Bunce had seen at a glance that he was not a gentleman,--had
seen, moreover, that such a man could have come only upon one
mission. She was right there too. This visitor had come about money.
"About this bill, Mr. Finn," said the visitor, proceeding to take
out of his breast coat-pocket a rather large leathern case, as he
advanced up towards the fire. "My name is Clarkson, Mr. Finn. If I
may venture so far, I'll take a chair."
"Certainly, Mr. Clarkson," said Phineas, getting up and pointing to
a seat.
"Thankye, Mr. Finn, thankye. We shall be more comfortable doing
business sitting, shan't we?" Whereupon the horrid little man drew
himself close in to the fire, and spreading out his leathern case
upon his knees, began to turn over one suspicious bit of paper after
another, as though he were uncertain in what part of his portfolio
lay this identical bit which he was seeking. He seemed to be quite
at home, and to feel that there was no ground whatever for hurry
in such comfortable quarters. Phineas hated him at once,--with a
hatred altogether unconnected with the difficulty which his friend
Fitzgibbon had brought upon him.
"Here it is," said Mr. Clarkson at last. "Oh, dear me, dear me! the
third of November, and here we are in March! I didn't think it was
so bad as this;--I didn't indeed. This is very bad,--very bad! And
for Parliament gents, too, who should be more punctual than anybody,
because of the privilege. Shouldn't they now, Mr. Finn?"
"All men should be punctual, I suppose," said Phineas.
"Of course they should; of course they should. I always say to my
gents, 'Be punctual, and I'll do anything for you.' But, perhaps, Mr.
Finn, you can hand me a cheque for this amount, and then you and I
will begin square."
"Indeed I cannot, Mr. Clarkson."
"Not hand me a cheque for it!"
"Upon my word, no."
"That's very bad;--very bad indeed. Then I suppose I must take the
half, and renew for the remainder, though I don't like it;--I don't
indeed."
"I can pay no part of that bill, Mr. Clarkson."
"Pay no part of it!" and Mr. Clarkson, in order that he might the
better express his surprise, arrested his hand in the very act of
poking his host's fire.
"If you'll allow me, I'll manage the fire," said Phineas, putting out
his hand for the poker.
But Mr. Clarkson was fond of poking fires, and would not surrender
the poker. "Pay no part of it!" he said again, holding the poker away
from Phineas in his left hand. "Don't say that, Mr. Finn. Pray don't
say that. Don't drive me to be severe. I don't like to be severe with
my gents. I'll do anything, Mr. Finn, if you'll only be punctual."
"The fact is, Mr. Clarkson, I have never had one penny of
consideration for that bill, and--"
"Oh, Mr. Finn! oh, Mr. Finn!" and then Mr. Clarkson had his will of
the fire.
"I never had one penny of consideration for that bill," continued
Phineas. "Of course, I don't deny my responsibility."
"No, Mr. Finn; you can't deny that. Here it is;--Phineas Finn;--and
everybody knows you, because you're a Parliament gent."
"I don't deny it. But I had no reason to suppose that I should
be called upon for the money when I accommodated my friend, Mr.
Fitzgibbon, and I have not got it. That is the long and the short
of it. I must see him and take care that arrangements are made."
"Arrangements!"
"Yes, arrangements for settling the bill."
"He hasn't got the money, Mr. Finn. You know that as well as I do."
"I know nothing about it, Mr. Clarkson."
"Oh yes, Mr. Finn; you know; you know."
"I tell you I know nothing about it," said Phineas, waxing angry.
"As to Mr. Fitzgibbon, he's the pleasantest gent that ever lived.
Isn't he now? I've know'd him these ten years. I don't suppose that
for ten years I've been without his name in my pocket. But, bless
you, Mr. Finn, there's an end to everything. I shouldn't have looked
at this bit of paper if it hadn't been for your signature. Of course
not. You're just beginning, and it's natural you should want a little
help. You'll find me always ready, if you'll only be punctual."
"I tell you again, sir, that I never had a shilling out of that for
myself, and do not want any such help." Here Mr. Clarkson smiled
sweetly. "I gave my name to my friend simply to oblige him."
"I like you Irish gents because you do hang together so close," said
Mr. Clarkson.
"Simply to oblige him," continued Phineas. "As I said before, I know
that I am responsible; but, as I said before also, I have not the
means of taking up that bill. I will see Mr. Fitzgibbon, and let
you know what we propose to do." Then Phineas got up from his seat
and took his hat. It was full time that he should go down to his
Committee. But Mr. Clarkson did not get up from his seat. "I'm afraid
I must ask you to leave me now, Mr. Clarkson, as I have business down
at the House."
"Business at the House never presses, Mr. Finn," said Mr. Clarkson.
"That's the best of Parliament. I've known Parliament gents this
thirty years and more. Would you believe it--I've had a Prime
Minister's name in that portfolio; that I have; and a Lord
Chancellor's; that I have;--and an Archbishop's too. I know
what Parliament is, Mr. Finn. Come, come; don't put me off with
Parliament."
There he sat before the fire with his pouch open before him, and
Phineas had no power of moving him. Could Phineas have paid him the
money which was manifestly due to him on the bill, the man would of
course have gone; but failing in that, Phineas could not turn him
out. There was a black cloud on the young member's brow, and great
anger at his heart,--against Fitzgibbon rather than against the man
who was sitting there before him. "Sir," he said, "it is really
imperative that I should go. I am pledged to an appointment at the
House at twelve, and it wants now only a quarter. I regret that your
interview with me should be so unsatisfactory, but I can only promise
you that I will see Mr. Fitzgibbon."
"And when shall I call again, Mr. Finn?"
"Perhaps I had better write to you," said Phineas.
"Oh dear, no," said Mr. Clarkson. "I should much prefer to look in.
Looking in is always best. We can get to understand one another in
that way. Let me see. I daresay you're not particular. Suppose I say
Sunday morning."
"Really, I could not see you on Sunday morning, Mr. Clarkson."
"Parliament gents ain't generally particular,--'speciaily not among
the Catholics," pleaded Mr. Clarkson.
"I am always engaged on Sundays," said Phineas.
"Suppose we say Monday,--or Tuesday. Tuesday morning at eleven. And
do be punctual, Mr. Finn. At Tuesday morning I'll come, and then no
doubt I shall find you ready." Whereupon Mr. Clarkson slowly put up
his bills within his portfolio, and then, before Phineas knew where
he was, had warmly shaken that poor dismayed member of Parliament by
the hand. "Only do be punctual, Mr. Finn," he said, as he made his
way down the stairs.
It was now twelve, and Phineas rushed off to a cab. He was in such
a fervour of rage and misery that he could hardly think of his
position, or what he had better do, till he got into the Committee
Room; and when there he could think of nothing else. He intended to
go deeply into the question of potted peas, holding an equal balance
between the assailed Government offices on the one hand, and the
advocates of the potted peas on the other. The potters of the peas,
who wanted to sell their article to the Crown, declared that an
extensive,--perhaps we may say, an unlimited,--use of the article
would save the whole army and navy from the scourges of scurvy,
dyspepsia, and rheumatism, would be the best safeguard against
typhus and other fevers, and would be an invaluable aid in all other
maladies to which soldiers and sailors are peculiarly subject. The
peas in question were grown on a large scale in Holstein, and their
growth had been fostered with the special object of doing good to the
British army and navy. The peas were so cheap that there would be a
great saving in money,--and it really had seemed to many that the
officials of the Horse Guards and the Admiralty had been actuated
by some fiendish desire to deprive their men of salutary fresh
vegetables, simply because they were of foreign growth. But the
officials of the War Office and the Admiralty declared that the
potted peas in question were hardly fit for swine. The motion for the
Committee had been made by a gentleman of the opposition, and Phineas
had been put upon it as an independent member. He had resolved to
give it all his mind, and, as far as he was concerned, to reach a
just decision, in which there should be no favour shown to the
Government side. New brooms are proverbial for thorough work,
and in this Committee work Phineas was as yet a new broom. But,
unfortunately, on this day his mind was so harassed that he could
hardly understand what was going on. It did not, perhaps, much
signify, as the witnesses examined were altogether agricultural. They
only proved the production of peas in Holstein,--a fact as to which
Phineas had no doubt. The proof was naturally slow, as the evidence
was given in German, and had to be translated into English. And
the work of the day was much impeded by a certain member who
unfortunately spoke German, who seemed to be fond of speaking German
before his brethren of the Committee, and who was curious as to
agriculture in Holstein generally. The chairman did not understand
German, and there was a difficulty in checking this gentleman, and
in making him understand that his questions were not relevant to the
issue.
Phineas could not keep his mind during the whole afternoon from the
subject of his misfortune. What should he do if this horrid man came
to him once or twice a week? He certainly did owe the man the money.
He must admit that to himself. The man no doubt was a dishonest
knave who had discounted the bill probably at fifty per cent; but,
nevertheless, Phineas had made himself legally responsible for the
amount. The privilege of the House prohibited him from arrest. He
thought of that very often, but the thought only made him the more
unhappy. Would it not be said, and might it not be said truly, that
he had incurred this responsibility,--a responsibility which he was
altogether unequal to answer,--because he was so protected? He did
feel that a certain consciousness of his privilege had been present
to him when he had put his name across the paper, and there had been
dishonesty in that very consciousness. And of what service would his
privilege be to him, if this man could harass every hour of his
life? The man was to be with him again in a day or two, and when the
appointment had been proposed, he, Phineas, had not dared to negative
it. And how was he to escape? As for paying the bill, that with him
was altogether impossible. The man had told him,--and he had believed
the man,--that payment by Fitzgibbon was out of the question. And
yet Fitzgibbon was the son of a peer, whereas he was only the son of
a country doctor! Of course Fitzgibbon must make some effort,--some
great effort,--and have the thing settled. Alas, alas! He knew enough
of the world already to feel that the hope was vain.
He went down from the Committee Room into the House, and he dined
at the House, and remained there until eight or nine at night; but
Fitzgibbon did not come. He then went to the Reform Club, but he was
not there. Both at the club and in the House many men spoke to him
about the debate of the previous night, expressing surprise that he
had not spoken,--making him more and more wretched. He saw Mr. Monk,
but Mr. Monk was walking arm in arm with his colleague, Mr. Palliser,
and Phineas could do no more than just speak to them. He thought that
Mr. Monk's nod of recognition was very cold. That might be fancy, but
it certainly was a fact that Mr. Monk only nodded to him. He would
tell Mr. Monk the truth, and then, if Mr. Monk chose to quarrel with
him, he at any rate would take no step to renew their friendship.
From the Reform Club he went to the Shakspeare, a smaller club to
which Fitzgibbon belonged,--and of which Phineas much wished to
become a member,--and to which he knew that his friend resorted when
he wished to enjoy himself thoroughly, and to be at ease in his
inn. Men at the Shakspeare could do as they pleased. There were no
politics there, no fashion, no stiffness, and no rules,--so men said;
but that was hardly true. Everybody called everybody by his Christian
name, and members smoked all over the house. They who did not belong
to the Shakspeare thought it an Elysium upon earth; and they who
did, believed it to be among Pandemoniums the most pleasant. Phineas
called at the Shakspeare, and was told by the porter that Mr.
Fitzgibbon was up-stairs. He was shown into the strangers room, and
in five minutes his friend came down to him.
"I want you to come down to the Reform with me," said Phineas.
"By jingo, my dear fellow, I'm in the middle of a rubber of whist."
"There has been a man with me about that bill."
"What;--Clarkson?"
"Yes, Clarkson," said Phineas.
"Don't mind him," said Fitzgibbon.
"That's nonsense. How am I to help minding him? I must mind him. He
is coming to me again on Tuesday morning."
"Don't see him."
"How can I help seeing him?"
"Make them say you're not at home."
"He has made an appointment. He has told me that he'll never leave me
alone. He'll be the death of me if this is not settled."
"It shall be settled, my dear fellow. I'll see about it. I'll see
about it and write you a line. You must excuse me now, because those
fellows are waiting. I'll have it all arranged."
Again as Phineas went home he thoroughly wished that he had not
seceded from Mr. Low.
CHAPTER XXII
Lady Baldock at Home
About the middle of March Lady Baldock came up from Baddingham to
London, coerced into doing so, as Violet Effingham declared, in
thorough opposition to all her own tastes, by the known wishes of her
friends and relatives. Her friends and relatives, so Miss Effingham
insinuated, were unanimous in wishing that Lady Baldock should
remain at Baddingham Park, and therefore,--that wish having been
indiscreetly expressed,--she had put herself to great inconvenience,
and had come to London in March. "Gustavus will go mad," said Violet
to Lady Laura. The Gustavus in question was the Lord Baldock of the
present generation, Miss Effingham's Lady Baldock being the peer's
mother. "Why does not Lord Baldock take a house himself?" asked Lady
Laura. "Don't you know, my dear," Violet answered, "how much we
Baddingham people think of money? We don't like being vexed and
driven mad, but even that is better than keeping up two households."
As regarded Violet, the injury arising from Lady Baldock's early
migration was very great, for she was thus compelled to move from
Grosvenor Place to Lady Baldock's house in Berkeley Square. "As you
are so fond of being in London, Augusta and I have made up our minds
to come up before Easter," Lady Baldock had written to her.
"I shall go to her now," Violet had said to her friend, "because I
have not quite made up my mind as to what I will do for the future."
"Marry Oswald, and be your own mistress."
"I mean to be my own mistress without marrying Oswald, though I don't
see my way quite clearly as yet. I think I shall set up a little
house of my own, and let the world say what it pleases. I suppose
they couldn't make me out to be a lunatic."
"I shouldn't wonder if they were to try," said Lady Laura.
"They could not prevent me in any other way. But I am in the dark as
yet, and so I shall be obedient and go to my aunt."
Miss Effingham went to Berkeley Square, and Phineas Finn was
introduced to Lady Baldock. He had been often in Grosvenor Place,
and had seen Violet frequently. Mr. Kennedy gave periodical
dinners,--once a week,--to which everybody went who could get an
invitation; and Phineas had been a guest more than once. Indeed, in
spite of his miseries he had taken to dining out a good deal, and was
popular as an eater of dinners. He could talk when wanted, and did
not talk too much, was pleasant in manners and appearance, and had
already achieved a certain recognised position in London life. Of
those who knew him intimately, not one in twenty were aware from
whence he came, what was his parentage, or what his means of living.
He was a member of Parliament, a friend of Mr. Kennedy's, was
intimate with Mr. Monk, though an Irishman did not as a rule herd
with other Irishmen, and was the right sort of person to have at your
house. Some people said he was a cousin of Lord Brentford's, and
others declared that he was Lord Chiltern's earliest friend. There he
was, however, with a position gained, and even Lady Baldock asked him
to her house.
Lady Baldock had evenings. People went to her house, and stood about
the room and on the stairs, talked to each other for half an hour,
and went away. In these March days there was no crowding, but still
there were always enough of people there to show that Lady Baldock
was successful. Why people should have gone to Lady Baldock's I
cannot explain;--but there are houses to which people go without
any reason. Phineas received a little card asking him to go, and he
always went.
"I think you like my friend, Mr. Finn," Lady Laura said to Miss
Effingham, after the first of these evenings.
"Yes, I do. I like him decidedly."
"So do I. I should hardly have thought that you would have taken a
fancy to him."
"I hardly know what you call taking a fancy," said Violet. "I am not
quite sure I like to be told that I have taken a fancy for a young
man."
"I mean no offence, my dear."
"Of course you don't But, to speak truth, I think I have rather taken
a fancy to him. There is just enough of him, but not too much. I
don't mean materially,--in regard to his inches; but as to his mental
belongings. I hate a stupid man who can't talk to me, and I hate a
clever man who talks me down. I don't like a man who is too lazy to
make any effort to shine; but I particularly dislike the man who is
always striving for effect. I abominate a humble man, but yet I love
to perceive that a man acknowledges the superiority of my sex, and
youth, and all that kind of thing."
"You want to be flattered without plain flattery."
"Of course I do. A man who would tell me that I am pretty, unless he
is over seventy, ought to be kicked out of the room. But a man who
can't show me that he thinks me so without saying a word about it,
is a lout. Now in all those matters, your friend, Mr. Finn, seems to
know what he is about. In other words, he makes himself pleasant,
and, therefore, one is glad to see him."
"I suppose you do not mean to fall in love with him?"
"Not that I know of, my dear. But when I do, I'll be sure to give you
notice."
I fear that there was more of earnestness in Lady Laura's last
question than Miss Effingham had supposed. She had declared to
herself over and over again that she had never been in love with
Phineas Finn. She had acknowledged to herself, before Mr. Kennedy had
asked her hand in marriage, that there had been danger,--that she
could have learned to love the man if such love would not have been
ruinous to her,--that the romance of such a passion would have been
pleasant to her. She had gone farther than this, and had said to
herself that she would have given way to that romance, and would have
been ready to accept such love if offered to her, had she not put
it out of her own power to marry a poor man by her generosity to
her brother. Then she had thrust the thing aside, and had clearly
understood,--she thought that she had clearly understood,--that life
for her must be a matter of business. Was it not the case with nine
out of every ten among mankind, with nine hundred and ninety-nine out
of every thousand, that life must be a matter of business and not of
romance? Of course she could not marry Mr. Finn, knowing, as she did,
that neither of them had a shilling. Of all men in the world she
esteemed Mr. Kennedy the most, and when these thoughts were passing
through her mind, she was well aware that he would ask her to be
his wife. Had she not resolved that she would accept the offer, she
would not have gone to Loughlinter. Having put aside all romance as
unfitted to her life, she could, she thought, do her duty as Mr.
Kennedy's wife. She would teach herself to love him. Nay,--she had
taught herself to love him. She was at any rate so sure of her
own heart that she would never give her husband cause to rue the
confidence he placed in her. And yet there was something sore within
her when she thought that Phineas Finn was fond of Violet Effingham.
It was Lady Baldock's second evening, and Phineas came to the house
at about eleven o'clock. At this time he had encountered a second
and a third interview with Mr. Clarkson, and had already failed in
obtaining any word of comfort from Laurence Fitzgibbon about the
bill. It was clear enough now that Laurence felt that they were both
made safe by their privilege, and that Mr. Clarkson should be treated
as you treat the organ-grinders. They are a nuisance and must be
endured. But the nuisance is not so great but what you can live in
comfort,--if only you are not too sore as to the annoyance. "My dear
fellow," Laurence had said to him, "I have had Clarkson almost living
in my rooms. He used to drink nearly a pint of sherry a day for me.
All I looked to was that I didn't live there at the same time. If you
wish it, I'll send in the sherry." This was very bad, and Phineas
tried to quarrel with his friend; but he found that it was difficult
to quarrel with Laurence Fitzgibbon.
But though on this side Phineas was very miserable, on another side
he had obtained great comfort. Mr. Monk and he were better friends
than ever. "As to what Turnbull says about me in the House," Mr.
Monk had said, laughing; "he and I understand each other perfectly.
I should like to see you on your legs, but it is just as well,
perhaps, that you have deferred it. We shall have the real question
on immediately after Easter, and then you'll have plenty of
opportunities." Phineas had explained how he had attempted, how he
had failed, and how he had suffered;--and Mr. Monk had been generous
in his sympathy. "I know all about it," said he, "and have gone
through it all myself. The more respect you feel for the House,
the more satisfaction you will have in addressing it when you have
mastered this difficulty."
The first person who spoke to Phineas at Lady Baldock's was Miss
Fitzgibbon, Laurence's sister. Aspasia Fitzgibbon was a warm woman as
regarded money, and as she was moreover a most discreet spinster,
she was made welcome by Lady Baldock, in spite of the well-known
iniquities of her male relatives. "Mr. Finn," said she, "how d'ye do?
I want to say a word to ye. Just come here into the corner." Phineas,
not knowing how to escape, did retreat into the corner with Miss
Fitzgibbon. "Tell me now, Mr. Finn;--have ye been lending money to
Laurence?"
"No; I have lent him no money," said Phineas, much astonished by the
question.
"Don't. That's my advice to ye. Don't. On any other matter Laurence
is the best creature in the world,--but he's bad to lend money to.
You ain't in any hobble with him, then?"
"Well;--nothing to speak of. What makes you ask?"
"Then you are in a hobble? Dear, dear! I never saw such a man as
Laurence;--never. Good-bye. I wouldn't do it again, if I were
you;--that's all." Then Miss Fitzgibbon came out of the corner and
made her way down-stairs.
Phineas immediately afterwards came across Miss Effingham. "I did not
know," said she, "that you and the divine Aspasia were such close
allies."
"We are the dearest friends in the world, but she has taken my breath
away now."
"May a body be told how she has done that?" Violet asked.
"Well, no; I'm afraid not, even though the body be Miss Effingham. It
was a profound secret;--really a secret concerning a third person,
and she began about it just as though she were speaking about the
weather!"
"How charming! I do so like her. You haven't heard, have you, that
Mr. Ratler proposed to her the other day?"
"No!"
"But he did;--at least, so she tells everybody. She said she'd take
him if he would promise to get her brother's salary doubled."
"Did she tell you?"
"No; not me. And of course I don't believe a word of it. I suppose
Barrington Erle made up the story. Are you going out of town next
week, Mr. Finn?" The week next to this was Easter-week. "I heard you
were going into Northamptonshire."
"From Lady Laura?"
"Yes;--from Lady Laura."
"I intend to spend three days with Lord Chiltern at Willingford. It
is an old promise. I am going to ride his horses,--that is, if I am
able to ride them."
"Take care what you are about, Mr. Finn;--they say his horses are so
dangerous!"
"I'm rather good at falling, I flatter myself."
"I know that Lord Chiltern rides anything he can sit, so long as it
is some animal that nobody else will ride. It was always so with him.
He is so odd; is he not?"
Phineas knew, of course, that Lord Chiltern had more than once asked
Violet Effingham to be his wife,--and he believed that she, from her
intimacy with Lady Laura, must know that he knew it. He had also
heard Lady Laura express a very strong wish that, in spite of these
refusals, Violet might even yet become her brother's wife. And
Phineas also knew that Violet Effingham was becoming, in his own
estimation, the most charming woman of his acquaintance. How was he
to talk to her about Lord Chiltern?
"He is odd," said Phineas; "but he is an excellent fellow,--whom his
father altogether misunderstands."
"Exactly,--just so; I am so glad to hear you say that,--you who have
never had the misfortune to have anything to do with a bad set. Why
don't you tell Lord Brentford? Lord Brentford would listen to you."
"To me?"
"Yes;--of course he would,--for you are just the link that is
wanting. You are Chiltern's intimate friend, and you are also the
friend of big-wigs and Cabinet Ministers."
"Lord Brentford would put me down at once if I spoke to him on such a
subject."
"I am sure he would not. You are too big to be put down, and no man
can really dislike to hear his son well spoken of by those who are
well spoken of themselves. Won't you try, Mr. Finn?" Phineas said
that he would think of it,--that he would try if any fit opportunity
could be found. "Of course you know how intimate I have been with the
Standishes," said Violet; "that Laura is to me a sister, and that
Oswald used to be almost a brother."
"Why do not you speak to Lord Brentford;--you who are his favourite?"
"There are reasons, Mr. Finn. Besides, how can any girl come forward
and say that she knows the disposition of any man? You can live with
Lord Chiltern, and see what he is made of, and know his thoughts, and
learn what is good in him, and also what is bad. After all, how is
any girl really to know anything of a man's life?"
"If I can do anything, Miss Effingham, I will," said Phineas.
"And then we shall all of us be so grateful to you," said Violet,
with her sweetest smile.
Phineas, retreating from this conversation, stood for a while alone,
thinking of it. Had she spoken thus of Lord Chiltern because she did
love him or because she did not? And the sweet commendations which
had fallen from her lips upon him,--him, Phineas Finn,--were they
compatible with anything like a growing partiality for himself, or
were they incompatible with any such feeling? Had he most reason to
be comforted or to be discomfited by what had taken place? It seemed
hardly possible to his imagination that Violet Effingham should
love such a nobody as he. And yet he had had fair evidence that one
standing as high in the world as Violet Effingham would fain have
loved him could she have followed the dictates of her heart. He had
trembled when he had first resolved to declare his passion to Lady
Laura,--fearing that she would scorn him as being presumptuous. But
there had been no cause for such fear as that. He had declared his
love, and she had not thought him to be presumptuous. That now was
ages ago,--eight months since; and Lady Laura had become a married
woman. Since he had become so warmly alive to the charms of Violet
Effingham he had determined, with stern propriety, that a passion for
a married woman was disgraceful. Such love was in itself a sin, even
though it was accompanied by the severest forbearance and the most
rigid propriety of conduct. No;--Lady Laura had done wisely to check
the growing feeling of partiality which she had admitted; and now
that she was married, he would be as wise as she. It was clear to him
that, as regarded his own heart, the way was open to him for a new
enterprise. But what if he were to fail again, and be told by Violet,
when he declared his love, that she had just engaged herself to Lord
Chiltern!
"What were you and Violet talking about so eagerly?" said Lady Laura
to him, with a smile that, in its approach to laughter, almost
betrayed its mistress.
"We were talking about your brother."
"You are going to him, are you not?"
"Yes; I leave London on Sunday night;--but only for a day or two."
"Has he any chance there, do you think?"
"What, with Miss Effingham?"
"Yes;--with Violet. Sometimes I think she loves him."
"How can I say? In such a matter you can judge better than I can do.
One woman with reference to another can draw the line between love
and friendship. She certainly likes Chiltern."
"Oh, I believe she loves him. I do indeed. But she fears him. She
does not quite understand how much there is of tenderness with that
assumed ferocity. And Oswald is so strange, so unwise, so impolitic,
that though he loves her better than all the world beside, he will
not sacrifice even a turn of a word to win her. When he asks her to
marry him, he almost flies at her throat, as an angry debtor who
applies for instant payment. Tell him, Mr. Finn, never to give it
over;--and teach him that he should be soft with her. Tell him, also,
that in her heart she likes him. One woman, as you say, knows another
woman; and I am certain he would win her if he would only be gentle
with her." Then, again, before they parted, Lady Laura told him that
this marriage was the dearest wish of her heart, and that there would
be no end to her gratitude if Phineas could do anything to promote
it. All which again made our hero unhappy.
CHAPTER XXIII
Sunday in Grosvenor Place
Mr. Kennedy, though he was a most scrupulously attentive member of
Parliament, was a man very punctual to hours and rules in his own
house,--and liked that his wife should be as punctual as himself.
Lady Laura, who in marrying him had firmly resolved that she would do
her duty to him in all ways, even though the ways might sometimes be
painful,--and had been perhaps more punctilious in this respect than
she might have been had she loved him heartily,--was not perhaps
quite so fond of accurate regularity as her husband; and thus, by
this time, certain habits of his had become rather bonds than habits
to her. He always had prayers at nine, and breakfasted at a quarter
past nine, let the hours on the night before have been as late as
they might before the time for rest had come. After breakfast he
would open his letters in his study, but he liked her to be with
him, and desired to discuss with her every application he got from
a constituent. He had his private secretary in a room apart, but he
thought that everything should be filtered to his private secretary
through his wife. He was very anxious that she herself should
superintend the accounts of their own private expenditure, and had
taken some trouble to teach her an excellent mode of book-keeping.
He had recommended to her a certain course of reading,--which was
pleasant enough; ladies like to receive such recommendations; but Mr.
Kennedy, having drawn out the course, seemed to expect that his wife
should read the books he had named, and, worse still, that she should
read them in the time he had allocated for the work. This, I think,
was tyranny. Then the Sundays became very wearisome to Lady Laura.
Going to church twice, she had learnt, would be a part of her duty;
and though in her father's household attendance at church had never
been very strict, she had made up her mind to this cheerfully. But
Mr. Kennedy expected also that he and she should always dine together
on Sundays, that there should be no guests, and that there should be
no evening company. After all, the demand was not very severe, but
yet she found that it operated injuriously upon her comfort. The
Sundays were very wearisome to her, and made her feel that her lord
and master was--her lord and master. She made an effort or two to
escape, but the efforts were all in vain. He never spoke a cross word
to her. He never gave a stern command. But yet he had his way. "I
won't say that reading a novel on a Sunday is a sin," he said; "but
we must at any rate admit that it is a matter on which men disagree,
that many of the best of men are against such occupation on Sunday,
and that to abstain is to be on the safe side." So the novels were
put away, and Sunday afternoon with the long evening became rather
a stumbling-block to Lady Laura.
Those two hours, moreover, with her husband in the morning became
very wearisome to her. At first she had declared that it would be her
greatest ambition to help her husband in his work, and she had read
all the letters from the MacNabs and MacFies, asking to be made
gaugers and landing-waiters, with an assumed interest. But the work
palled upon her very quickly. Her quick intellect discovered soon
that there was nothing in it which she really did. It was all form
and verbiage, and pretence at business. Her husband went through it
all with the utmost patience, reading every word, giving orders as
to every detail, and conscientiously doing that which he conceived
he had undertaken to do. But Lady Laura wanted to meddle with high
politics, to discuss reform bills, to assist in putting up Mr. This
and putting down my Lord That. Why should she waste her time in
doing that which the lad in the next room, who was called a private
secretary, could do as well?
Still she would obey. Let the task be as hard as it might, she would
obey. If he counselled her to do this or that, she would follow his
counsel,--because she owed him so much. If she had accepted the half
of all his wealth without loving him, she owed him the more on that
account. But she knew,--she could not but know,--that her intellect
was brighter than his; and might it not be possible for her to lead
him? Then she made efforts to lead her husband, and found that he was
as stiff-necked as an ox. Mr. Kennedy was not, perhaps, a clever man;
but he was a man who knew his own way, and who intended to keep it.
"I have got a headache, Robert," she said to him one Sunday after
luncheon. "I think I will not go to church this afternoon."
"It is not serious, I hope."
"Oh dear no. Don't you know how one feels sometimes that one has got
a head? And when that is the case one's armchair is the best place."
"I am not sure of that," said Mr. Kennedy.
"If I went to church I should not attend," said Lady Laura.
"The fresh air would do you more good than anything else, and we
could walk across the park."
"Thank you;--I won't go out again to-day." This she said with
something almost of crossness in her manner, and Mr. Kennedy went to
the afternoon service by himself.
Lady Laura when she was left alone began to think of her position.
She was not more than four or five months married, and she was
becoming very tired of her life. Was it not also true that she was
becoming tired of her husband? She had twice told Phineas Finn that
of all men in the world she esteemed Mr. Kennedy the most. She did
not esteem him less now. She knew no point or particle in which
he did not do his duty with accuracy. But no person can live
happily with another,--not even with a brother or a sister or a
friend,--simply upon esteem. All the virtues in the calendar,
though they exist on each side, will not make a man and woman happy
together, unless there be sympathy. Lady Laura was beginning to
find out that there was a lack of sympathy between herself and her
husband.
She thought of this till she was tired of thinking of it, and then,
wishing to divert her mind, she took up the book that was lying
nearest to her hand. It was a volume of a new novel which she had
been reading on the previous day, and now, without much thought about
it, she went on with her reading. There came to her, no doubt, some
dim, half-formed idea that, as she was freed from going to church by
the plea of a headache, she was also absolved by the same plea from
other Sunday hindrances. A child, when it is ill, has buttered toast
and a picture-book instead of bread-and-milk and lessons. In this
way, Lady Laura conceived herself to be entitled to her novel.
While she was reading it, there came a knock at the door, and
Barrington Erle was shown upstairs. Mr. Kennedy had given no orders
against Sunday visitors, but had simply said that Sunday visiting was
not to his taste. Barrington, however, was Lady Laura's cousin, and
people must be very strict if they can't see their cousins on Sunday.
Lady Laura soon lost her headache altogether in the animation
of discussing the chances of the new Reform Bill with the Prime
Minister's private secretary; and had left her chair, and was
standing by the table with the novel in her hand, protesting this
and denying that, expressing infinite confidence in Mr. Monk, and
violently denouncing Mr. Turnbull, when her husband returned from
church and came up into the drawing-room. Lady Laura had forgotten
her headache altogether, and had in her composition none of that
thoughtfulness of hypocrisy which would have taught her to moderate
her political feeling at her husband's return.
"I do declare," she said, "that if Mr. Turnbull opposes the
Government measure now, because he can't have his own way in
everything, I will never again put my trust in any man who calls
himself a popular leader."
"You never should," said Barrington Erle.
"That's all very well for you, Barrington, who are an aristocratic
Whig of the old official school, and who call yourself a Liberal
simply because Fox was a Liberal a hundred years ago. My heart's in
it."
"Heart should never have anything to do with politics; should it?"
said Erle, turning round to Mr. Kennedy.
Mr. Kennedy did not wish to discuss the matter on a Sunday, nor yet
did he wish to say before Barrington Erle that he thought it wrong
to do so. And he was desirous of treating his wife in some way
as though she were an invalid,--that she thereby might be, as it
were, punished; but he did not wish to do this in such a way that
Barrington should be aware of the punishment.
"Laura had better not disturb herself about it now," he said.
"How is a person to help being disturbed?" said Lady Laura, laughing.
"Well, well; we won't mind all that now," said Mr. Kennedy, turning
away. Then he took up the novel which Lady Laura had just laid down
from her hand, and, having looked at it, carried it aside, and placed
it on a book-shelf which was remote from them. Lady Laura watched him
as he did this, and the whole course of her husband's thoughts on the
subject was open to her at once. She regretted the novel, and she
regretted also the political discussion. Soon afterwards Barrington
Erle went away, and the husband and wife were alone together.
"I am glad that your head is so much better," said he. He did not
intend to be severe, but he spoke with a gravity of manner which
almost amounted to severity.
"Yes; it is," she said, "Barrington's coming in cheered me up."
"I am sorry that you should have wanted cheering."
"Don't you know what I mean, Robert?"
"No; I do not think that I do, exactly."
"I suppose your head is stronger. You do not get that feeling
of dazed, helpless imbecility of brain, which hardly amounts to
headache, but which yet--is almost as bad."
"Imbecility of brain may be worse than headache, but I don't think it
can produce it."
"Well, well;--I don't know how to explain it."
"Headache comes, I think, always from the stomach, even when produced
by nervous affections. But imbecility of the brain--"
"Oh, Robert, I am so sorry that I used the word."
"I see that it did not prevent your reading," he said, after a pause.
"Not such reading as that. I was up to nothing better."
Then there was another pause.
"I won't deny that it may be a prejudice," he said, "but I confess
that the use of novels in my own house on Sundays is a pain to me.
My mother's ideas on the subject are very strict, and I cannot think
that it is bad for a son to hang on to the teaching of his mother."
This he said in the most serious tone which he could command.
"I don't know why I took it up," said Lady Laura. "Simply, I believe,
because it was there. I will avoid doing so for the future."
"Do, my dear," said the husband. "I shall be obliged and grateful if
you will remember what I have said." Then he left her, and she sat
alone, first in the dusk and then in the dark, for two hours, doing
nothing. Was this to be the life which she had procured for herself
by marrying Mr. Kennedy of Loughlinter? If it was harsh and
unendurable in London, what would it be in the country?
CHAPTER XXIV
The Willingford Bull
Phineas left London by a night mail train on Easter Sunday, and found
himself at the Willingford Bull about half an hour after midnight.
Lord Chiltern was up and waiting for him, and supper was on the
table. The Willingford Bull was an English inn of the old stamp,
which had now, in these latter years of railway travelling, ceased
to have a road business,--for there were no travellers on the road,
and but little posting--but had acquired a new trade as a dépôt for
hunters and hunting men. The landlord let out horses and kept hunting
stables, and the house was generally filled from the beginning of
November till the middle of April. Then it became a desert in the
summer, and no guests were seen there, till the pink coats flocked
down again into the shires.
"How many days do you mean to give us?" said Lord Chiltern, as he
helped his friend to a devilled leg of turkey.
"I must go back on Wednesday," said Phineas.
"That means Wednesday night. I'll tell you what we'll do. We've the
Cottesmore to-morrow. We'll get into Tailby's country on Tuesday, and
Fitzwilliam will be only twelve miles off on Wednesday. We shall be
rather short of horses."
"Pray don't let me put you out. I can hire something here, I
suppose?"
"You won't put me out at all. There'll be three between us each day,
and we'll run our luck. The horses have gone on to Empingham for
to-morrow. Tailby is rather a way off,--at Somerby; but we'll manage
it. If the worst comes to the worst, we can get back to Stamford by
rail. On Wednesday we shall have everything very comfortable. They're
out beyond Stilton and will draw home our way. I've planned it all
out. I've a trap with a fast stepper, and if we start to-morrow at
half-past nine, we shall be in plenty of time. You shall ride Meg
Merrilies, and if she don't carry you, you may shoot her."
"Is she one of the pulling ones?"
"She is heavy in hand if you are heavy at her, but leave her mouth
alone and she'll go like flowing water. You'd better not ride more
in a crowd than you can help. Now what'll you drink?"
They sat up half the night smoking and talking, and Phineas learned
more about Lord Chiltern then than ever he had learned before. There
was brandy and water before them, but neither of them drank. Lord
Chiltern, indeed, had a pint of beer by his side from which he sipped
occasionally. "I've taken to beer," he said, "as being the best drink
going. When a man hunts six days a week he can afford to drink beer.
I'm on an allowance,--three pints a day. That's not too much."
"And you drink nothing else?"
"Nothing when I'm alone,--except a little cherry-brandy when I'm out.
I never cared for drink;--never in my life. I do like excitement, and
have been less careful than I ought to have been as to what it has
come from. I could give up drink to-morrow, without a struggle,--if
it were worth my while to make up my mind to do it. And it's the same
with gambling. I never do gamble now, because I've got no money; but
I own I like it better than anything in the world. While you are at
it, there is life in it."
"You should take to politics, Chiltern."
"And I would have done so, but my father would not help me. Never
mind, we will not talk about him. How does Laura get on with her
husband?"
"Very happily, I should say."
"I don't believe it," said Lord Chiltern. "Her temper is too much
like mine to allow her to be happy with such a log of wood as Robert
Kennedy. It is such men as he who drive me out of the pale of decent
life. If that is decency, I'd sooner be indecent. You mark my words.
They'll come to grief. She'll never be able to stand it."
"I should think she had her own way in everything," said Phineas.
"No, no. Though he's a prig, he's a man; and she will not find it
easy to drive him."
"But she may bend him."
"Not an inch;--that is if I understand his character. I suppose you
see a good deal of them?"
"Yes,--pretty well. I'm not there so often as I used to be in the
Square."
"You get sick of it, I suppose. I should. Do you see my father
often?"
"Only occasionally. He is always very civil when I do see him."
"He is the very pink of civility when he pleases, but the most unjust
man I ever met."
"I should not have thought that."
"Yes, he is," said the Earl's son, "and all from lack of judgment to
discern the truth. He makes up his mind to a thing on insufficient
proof, and then nothing will turn him. He thinks well of you,--would
probably believe your word on any indifferent subject without thought
of a doubt; but if you were to tell him that I didn't get drunk every
night of my life and spend most of my time in thrashing policemen, he
would not believe you. He would smile incredulously and make you a
little bow. I can see him do it."
"You are too hard on him, Chiltern."
"He has been too hard on me, I know. Is Violet Effingham still in
Grosvenor Place?"
"No; she's with Lady Baldock."
"That old grandmother of evil has come to town,--has she? Poor
Violet! When we were young together we used to have such fun about
that old woman."
"The old woman is an ally of mine now," said Phineas.
"You make allies everywhere. You know Violet Effingham of course?"
"Oh yes. I know her."
"Don't you think her very charming?" said Lord Chiltern.
"Exceedingly charming."
"I have asked that girl to marry me three times, and I shall never
ask her again. There is a point beyond which a man shouldn't go.
There are many reasons why it would be a good marriage. In the first
place, her money would be serviceable. Then it would heal matters in
our family, for my father is as prejudiced in her favour as he is
against me. And I love her dearly. I've loved her all my life,--since
I used to buy cakes for her. But I shall never ask her again."
"I would if I were you," said Phineas,--hardly knowing what it might
be best for him to say.
"No; I never will. But I'll tell you what. I shall get into some
desperate scrape about her. Of course she'll marry, and that soon.
Then I shall make a fool of myself. When I hear that she is engaged I
shall go and quarrel with the man, and kick him,--or get kicked. All
the world will turn against me, and I shall be called a wild beast."
"A dog in the manger is what you should be called."
"Exactly;--but how is a man to help it? If you loved a girl, could
you see another man take her?" Phineas remembered of course that he
had lately come through this ordeal. "It is as though he were to come
and put his hand upon me, and wanted my own heart out of me. Though
I have no property in her at all, no right to her,--though she never
gave me a word of encouragement, it is as though she were the most
private thing in the world to me. I should be half mad, and in my
madness I could not master the idea that I was being robbed. I should
resent it as a personal interference."
"I suppose it will come to that if you give her up yourself," said
Phineas.
"It is no question of giving up. Of course I cannot make her marry
me. Light another cigar, old fellow."
Phineas, as he lit the other cigar, remembered that he owed a certain
duty in this matter to Lady Laura. She had commissioned him to
persuade her brother that his suit with Violet Effingham would not be
hopeless, if he could only restrain himself in his mode of conducting
it. Phineas was disposed to do his duty, although he felt it to be
very hard that he should be called upon to be eloquent against his
own interest. He had been thinking for the last quarter of an hour
how he must bear himself if it might turn out that he should be the
man whom Lord Chiltern was resolved to kick. He looked at his friend
and host, and became aware that a kicking-match with such a one would
not be pleasant pastime. Nevertheless, he would be happy enough to be
subject to Lord Chiltern's wrath for such a reason. He would do his
duty by Lord Chiltern; and then, when that had been adequately done,
he would, if occasion served, fight a battle for himself.
"You are too sudden with her, Chiltern," he said, after a pause.
"What do you mean by too sudden?" said Lord Chiltern, almost angrily.
"You frighten her by being so impetuous. You rush at her as though
you wanted to conquer her by a single blow."
"So I do."
"You should be more gentle with her. You should give her time to find
out whether she likes you or not."
"She has known me all her life, and has found that out long ago. Not
but what you are right. I know you are right. If I were you, and had
your skill in pleasing, I should drop soft words into her ear till I
had caught her. But I have no gifts in that way. I am as awkward as
a pig at what is called flirting. And I have an accursed pride which
stands in my own light. If she were in this house this moment, and
if I knew she were to be had for asking, I don't think I could bring
myself to ask again. But we'll go to bed. It's half-past two, and we
must be off at half-past nine, if we're to be at Exton Park gates at
eleven."
Phineas, as he went up-stairs, assured himself that he had done his
duty. If there ever should come to be anything between him and Violet
Effingham, Lord Chiltern might quarrel with him,--might probably
attempt that kicking encounter to which allusion had been made,--but
nobody could justly say that he had not behaved honourably to his
friend.
On the next morning there was a bustle and a scurry, as there always
is on such occasions, and the two men got off about ten minutes after
time. But Lord Chiltern drove hard, and they reached the meet before
the master had moved off. They had a fair day's sport with the
Cottesmore; and Phineas, though he found that Meg Merrilies did
require a good deal of riding, went through his day's work with
credit. He had been riding since he was a child, as is the custom
with all boys in Munster, and had an Irishman's natural aptitude for
jumping. When they got back to the Willingford Bull he felt pleased
with the day and rather proud of himself. "It wasn't fast, you know,"
said Chiltern, "and I don't call that a stiff country. Besides, Meg
is very handy when you've got her out of the crowd. You shall ride
Bonebreaker to-morrow at Somerby, and you'll find that better fun."
"Bonebreaker? Haven't I heard you say he rushes like mischief?"
"Well, he does rush. But, by George! you want a horse to rush in that
country. When you have to go right through four or five feet of stiff
green wood, like a bullet through a target, you want a little force,
or you're apt to be left up a tree."
"And what do you ride?"
"A brute I never put my leg on yet. He was sent down to Wilcox here,
out of Lincolnshire, because they couldn't get anybody to ride him
there. They say he goes with his head up in the air, and won't look
at a fence that isn't as high as his breast. But I think he'll do
here. I never saw a better made beast, or one with more power. Do you
look at his shoulders. He's to be had for seventy pounds, and these
are the sort of horses I like to buy."
Again they dined alone, and Lord Chiltern explained to Phineas that
he rarely associated with the men of either of the hunts in which
he rode. "There is a set of fellows down here who are poison to me,
and there is another set, and I am poison to them. Everybody is
very civil, as you see, but I have no associates. And gradually I am
getting to have a reputation as though I were the devil himself. I
think I shall come out next year dressed entirely in black."
"Are you not wrong to give way to that kind of thing?"
"What the deuce am I to do? I can't make civil little speeches. When
once a man gets a reputation as an ogre, it is the most difficult
thing in the world to drop it. I could have a score of men here every
day if I liked it,--my title would do that for me;--but they would
be men I should loathe, and I should be sure to tell them so,
even though I did not mean it. Bonebreaker, and the new horse,
and another, went on at twelve to-day. You must expect hard work
to-morrow, as I daresay we shan't be home before eight."
The next day's meet was in Leicestershire, not far from Melton, and
they started early. Phineas, to tell the truth of him, was rather
afraid of Bonebreaker, and looked forward to the probability of an
accident. He had neither wife nor child, and nobody had a better
right to risk his neck. "We'll put a gag on 'im," said the groom,
"and you'll ride 'im in a ring,--so that you may well-nigh break
his jaw; but he is a rum un, sir." "I'll do my best," said Phineas.
"He'll take all that," said the groom. "Just let him have his own way
at everything," said Lord Chiltern, as they moved away from the meet
to Pickwell Gorse; "and if you'll only sit on his back, he'll carry
you through as safe as a church." Phineas could not help thinking
that the counsels of the master and of the groom were very different.
"My idea is," continued Lord Chiltern, "that in hunting you should
always avoid a crowd. I don't think a horse is worth riding that
will go in a crowd. It's just like yachting,--you should have plenty
of sea-room. If you're to pull your horse up at every fence till
somebody else is over, I think you'd better come out on a donkey."
And so they went away to Pickwell Gorse.
There were over two hundred men out, and Phineas began to think that
it might not be so easy to get out of the crowd. A crowd in a fast
run no doubt quickly becomes small by degrees and beautifully less;
but it is very difficult, especially for a stranger, to free himself
from the rush at the first start. Lord Chiltern's horse plunged about
so violently, as they stood on a little hill-side looking down upon
the cover, that he was obliged to take him to a distance, and Phineas
followed him. "If he breaks down wind," said Lord Chiltern, "we can't
be better than we are here. If he goes up wind, he must turn before
long, and we shall be all right." As he spoke an old hound opened
true and sharp,--an old hound whom all the pack believed,--and in a
moment there was no doubt that the fox had been found. "There are not
above eight or nine acres in it," said Lord Chiltern, "and he can't
hang long. Did you ever see such an uneasy brute as this in your
life? But I feel certain he'll go well when he gets away."
Phineas was too much occupied with his own horse to think much of
that on which Lord Chiltern was mounted. Bonebreaker, the very moment
that he heard the old hound's note, stretched out his head, and put
his mouth upon the bit, and began to tremble in every muscle. "He's
a great deal more anxious for it than you and I are," said Lord
Chiltern. "I see they've given you that gag. But don't you ride him
on it till he wants it. Give him lots of room, and he'll go in the
snaffle." All which caution made Phineas think that any insurance
office would charge very dear on his life at the present moment.
The fox took two rings of the gorse, and then he went,--up wind.
"It's not a vixen, I'll swear," said Lord Chiltern. "A vixen in cub
never went away like that yet. Now then, Finn, my boy, keep to the
right." And Lord Chiltern, with the horse out of Lincolnshire, went
away across the brow of the hill, leaving the hounds to the left, and
selected, as his point of exit into the next field, a stiff rail,
which, had there been an accident, must have put a very wide margin
of ground between the rider and his horse. "Go hard at your fences,
and then you'll fall clear," he had said to Phineas. I don't think,
however, that he would have ridden at the rail as he did, but
that there was no help for him. "The brute began in his own way,
and carried on after in the same fashion all through," he said
afterwards. Phineas took the fence a little lower down, and what
it was at which he rode he never knew. Bonebreaker sailed over it,
whatever it was, and he soon found himself by his friend's side.
The ruck of the men were lower down than our two heroes, and there
were others far away to the left, and others, again, who had been at
the end of the gorse, and were now behind. Our friends were not near
the hounds, not within two fields of them, but the hounds were below
them, and therefore could be seen. "Don't be in a hurry, and they'll
be round upon us," Lord Chiltern said. "How the deuce is one to help
being in a hurry?" said Phineas, who was doing his very best to ride
Bonebreaker with the snaffle, but had already began to feel that
Bonebreaker cared nothing for that weak instrument. "By George, I
should like to change with you," said Lord Chiltern. The Lincolnshire
horse was going along with his head very low, boring as he galloped,
but throwing his neck up at his fences, just when he ought to have
kept himself steady. After this, though Phineas kept near Lord
Chiltern throughout the run, they were not again near enough to
exchange words; and, indeed, they had but little breath for such
purpose.
Lord Chiltern rode still a little in advance, and Phineas, knowing
his friend's partiality for solitude when taking his fences, kept a
little to his left. He began to find that Bonebreaker knew pretty
well what he was about. As for not using the gag rein, that was
impossible. When a horse puts out what strength he has against a
man's arm, a man must put out what strength he has against the
horse's mouth. But Bonebreaker was cunning, and had had a gag rein
on before. He contracted his lip here, and bent out his jaw there,
till he had settled it to his mind, and then went away after his
own fashion. He seemed to have a passion for smashing through big,
high-grown ox-fences, and by degrees his rider came to feel that if
there was nothing worse coming, the fun was not bad.
The fox ran up wind for a couple of miles or so, as Lord Chiltern had
prophesied, and then turned,--not to the right, as would best have
served him and Phineas, but to the left,--so that they were forced
to make their way through the ruck of horses before they could place
themselves again. Phineas found himself crossing a road, in and out
of it, before he knew where he was, and for a while he lost sight of
Lord Chiltern. But in truth he was leading now, whereas Lord Chiltern
had led before. The two horses having been together all the morning,
and on the previous day, were willing enough to remain in company,
if they were allowed to do so. They both crossed the road, not very
far from each other, going in and out amidst a crowd of horses, and
before long were again placed well, now having the hunt on their
right, whereas hitherto it had been on their left. They went over
large pasture fields, and Phineas began to think that as long as
Bonebreaker would be able to go through the thick grown-up hedges,
all would be right. Now and again he came to a cut fence, a fence
that had been cut and laid, and these were not so pleasant. Force
was not sufficient for them, and they admitted of a mistake. But the
horse, though he would rush at them unpleasantly, took them when they
came without touching them. It might be all right yet,--unless the
beast should tire with him; and then, Phineas thought, a misfortune
might probably occur. He remembered, as he flew over one such
impediment, that he rode a stone heavier than his friend. At the end
of forty-five minutes Bonebreaker also might become aware of the
fact.
The hounds were running well in sight to their right, and Phineas
began to feel some of that pride which a man indulges when he becomes
aware that he has taken his place comfortably, has left the squad
behind, and is going well. There were men nearer the hounds than he
was, but he was near enough even for ambition. There had already been
enough of the run to make him sure that it would be a "good thing",
and enough to make him aware also that probably it might be too good.
When a run is over, men are very apt to regret the termination, who
a minute or two before were anxiously longing that the hounds might
pull down their game. To finish well is everything in hunting. To
have led for over an hour is nothing, let the pace and country have
been what they might, if you fall away during the last half mile.
Therefore it is that those behind hope that the fox may make this
or that cover, while the forward men long to see him turned over in
every field. To ride to hounds is very glorious; but to have ridden
to hounds is more glorious still. They had now crossed another road,
and a larger one, and had got into a somewhat closer country. The
fields were not so big, and the fences were not so high. Phineas got
a moment to look about him, and saw Lord Chiltern riding without his
cap. He was very red in the face, and his eyes seemed to glare, and
he was tugging at his horse with all his might. But the animal seemed
still to go with perfect command of strength, and Phineas had too
much work on his own hands to think of offering Quixotic assistance
to any one else. He saw some one, a farmer, as he thought, speak to
Lord Chiltern as they rode close together; but Chiltern only shook
his head and pulled at his horse.
There were brooks in those parts. The river Eye forms itself
thereabouts, or some of its tributaries do so; and these tributaries,
though small as rivers, are considerable to men on one side who are
called by the exigencies of the occasion to place themselves quickly
on the other. Phineas knew nothing of these brooks; but Bonebreaker
had gone gallantly over two, and now that there came a third in the
way, it was to be hoped that he might go gallantly over that also.
Phineas, at any rate, had no power to decide otherwise. As long as
the brute would go straight with him he could sit him; but he had
long given up the idea of having a will of his own. Indeed, till he
was within twenty yards of the brook, he did not see that it was
larger than the others. He looked around, and there was Chiltern
close to him, still fighting with his horse;--but the farmer had
turned away. He thought that Chiltern nodded to him, as much as to
tell him to go on. On he went at any rate. The brook, when he came to
it, seemed to be a huge black hole, yawning beneath him. The banks
were quite steep, and just where he was to take off there was an
ugly stump. It was too late to think of anything. He stuck his knees
against his saddle,--and in a moment was on the other side. The
brute, who had taken off a yard before the stump, knowing well the
danger of striking it with his foot, came down with a grunt, and did,
I think, begin to feel the weight of that extra stone. Phineas, as
soon as he was safe, looked back, and there was Lord Chiltern's horse
in the very act of his spring,--higher up the rivulet, where it was
even broader. At that distance Phineas could see that Lord Chiltern
was wild with rage against the beast. But whether he wished to take
the leap or wished to avoid it, there was no choice left to him. The
animal rushed at the brook, and in a moment the horse and horseman
were lost to sight. It was well then that that extra stone should
tell, as it enabled Phineas to arrest his horse and to come back to
his friend.
The Lincolnshire horse had chested the further bank, and of course
had fallen back into the stream. When Phineas got down he found that
Lord Chiltern was wedged in between the horse and the bank, which was
better, at any rate, than being under the horse in the water. "All
right, old fellow," he said, with a smile, when he saw Phineas. "You
go on; it's too good to lose." But he was very pale, and seemed to be
quite helpless where he lay. The horse did not move,--and never did
move again. He had smashed his shoulder to pieces against a stump on
the bank, and was afterwards shot on that very spot.
When Phineas got down he found that there was but little water where
the horse lay. The depth of the stream had been on the side from
which they had taken off, and the thick black mud lay within a foot
of the surface, close to the bank against which Lord Chiltern was
propped. "That's the worst one I ever was on," said Lord Chiltern;
"but I think he's gruelled now."
"Are you hurt?"
"Well;--I fancy there is something amiss. I can't move my arms; and I
catch my breath. My legs are all right if I could get away from this
accursed brute."
"I told you so," said the farmer, coming and looking down upon them
from the bank. "I told you so, but you wouldn't be said." Then he too
got down, and between them both they extricated Lord Chiltern from
his position, and got him on to the bank.
"That un's a dead un," said the farmer, pointing to the horse.
"So much the better," said his lordship. "Give us a drop of sherry,
Finn."
He had broken his collar-bone and three of his ribs. They got a
farmer's trap from Wissindine and took him into Oakham. When there,
he insisted on being taken on through Stamford to the Willingford
Bull before he would have his bones set,--picking up, however, a
surgeon at Stamford. Phineas remained with him for a couple of days,
losing his run with the Fitzwilliams and a day at the potted peas,
and became very fond of his patient as he sat by his bedside.
"That was a good run, though, wasn't it?" said Lord Chiltern
as Phineas took his leave. "And, by George, Phineas, you rode
Bonebreaker so well, that you shall have him as often as you'll come
down. I don't know how it is, but you Irish fellows always ride."
CHAPTER XXV
Mr. Turnbull's Carriage Stops the Way
When Phineas got back to London, a day after his time, he found that
there was already a great political commotion in the metropolis.
He had known that on Easter Monday and Tuesday there was to be
a gathering of the people in favour of the ballot, and that on
Wednesday there was to be a procession with a petition which Mr.
Turnbull was to receive from the hands of the people on Primrose
Hill. It had been at first intended that Mr. Turnbull should receive
the petition at the door of Westminster Hall on the Thursday; but he
had been requested by the Home Secretary to put aside this intention,
and he had complied with the request made to him. Mr. Mildmay was
to move the second reading of his Reform Bill on that day, the
preliminary steps having been taken without any special notice; but
the bill of course included no clause in favour of the ballot; and
this petition was the consequence of that omission. Mr. Turnbull had
predicted evil consequences, both in the House and out of it, and
was now doing the best in his power to bring about the verification
of his own prophecies. Phineas, who reached his lodgings late on the
Thursday, found that the town had been in a state of ferment for
three days, that on the Wednesday forty or fifty thousand persons had
been collected at Primrose Hill, and that the police had been forced
to interfere,--and that worse was expected on the Friday. Though Mr.
Turnbull had yielded to the Government as to receiving the petition,
the crowd was resolved that they would see the petition carried into
the House. It was argued that the Government would have done better
to have refrained from interfering as to the previously intended
arrangement. It would have been easier to deal with a procession than
with a mob of men gathered together without any semblance of form.
Mr. Mildmay had been asked to postpone the second reading of his
bill; but the request had come from his opponents, and he would
not yield to it. He said that it would be a bad expedient to close
Parliament from fear of the people. Phineas found at the Reform Club
on the Thursday evening that members of the House of Commons were
requested to enter on the Friday by the door usually used by the
peers, and to make their way thence to their own House. He found that
his landlord, Mr. Bunce, had been out with the people during the
entire three days;--and Mrs. Bunce, with a flood of tears, begged
Phineas to interfere as to the Friday. "He's that headstrong that
he'll be took if anybody's took; and they say that all Westminster is
to be lined with soldiers." Phineas on the Friday morning did have
some conversation with his landlord; but his first work on reaching
London was to see Lord Chiltern's friends, and tell them of the
accident.
The potted peas Committee sat on the Thursday, and he ought to have
been there. His absence, however, was unavoidable, as he could not
have left his friend's bed-side so soon after the accident. On the
Wednesday he had written to Lady Laura, and on the Thursday evening
he went first to Portman Square and then to Grosvenor Place.
"Of course he will kill himself some day," said the Earl,--with a
tear, however, in each eye.
"I hope not, my lord. He is a magnificent horseman; but accidents of
course will happen."
"How many of his bones are there not broken, I wonder?" said the
father. "It is useless to talk, of course. You think he is not in
danger?"
"Certainly not."
"I should fear that he would be so liable to inflammation."
"The doctor says that there is none. He has been taking an enormous
deal of exercise," said Phineas, "and drinking no wine. All that is
in his favour."
"What does he drink, then?" asked the Earl.
"Nothing. I rather think, my lord, you are mistaken a little about
his habits. I don't fancy he ever drinks unless he is provoked to do
it."
"Provoked! Could anything provoke you to make a brute of yourself?
But I am glad that he is in no danger. If you hear of him, let me
know how he goes on."
Lady Laura was of course full of concern. "I wanted to go down to
him," she said, "but Mr. Kennedy thought that there was no occasion."
"Nor is there any;--I mean in regard to danger. He is very solitary
there."
"You must go to him again. Mr. Kennedy will not let me go unless I
can say that there is danger. He seems to think that because Oswald
has had accidents before, it is nothing. Of course I cannot leave
London without his leave."
"Your brother makes very little of it, you know."
"Ah;--he would make little of anything. But if I were ill he would be
in London by the first train."
"Kennedy would let you go if you asked him."
"But he advises me not to go. He says my duty does not require it,
unless Oswald be in danger. Don't you know, Mr. Finn, how hard it is
for a wife not to take advice when it is so given?" This she said,
within six months of her marriage, to the man who had been her
husband's rival!
Phineas asked her whether Violet had heard the news, and learned that
she was still ignorant of it. "I got your letter only this morning,
and I have not seen her," said Lady Laura. "Indeed, I am so angry
with her that I hardly wish to see her." Thursday was Lady Baldock's
night, and Phineas went from Grosvenor Place to Berkeley Square.
There he saw Violet, and found that she had heard of the accident.
"I am so glad to see you, Mr. Finn," she said. "Do tell me;--is it
much?"
"Much in inconvenience, certainly; but not much in danger."
"I think Laura was so unkind not to send me word! I only heard it
just now. Did you see it?"
"I was close to him, and helped him up. The horse jumped into a river
with him, and crushed him up against the bank."
"How lucky that you should be there! Had you jumped the river?"
"Yes;--almost unintentionally, for my horse was rushing so that I
could not hold him. Chiltern was riding a brute that no one should
have ridden. No one will again."
"Did he destroy himself?"
"He had to be killed afterwards. He broke his shoulder."
"How very lucky that you should have been near him,--and, again, how
lucky that you should not have been hurt yourself!"
"It was not likely that we should both come to grief at the same
fence."
"But it might have been you. And you think there is no danger?"
"None whatever,--if I may believe the doctor. His hunting is done for
this year, and he will be very desolate. I shall go down again to him
in a few days, and try to bring him up to town."
"Do;--do. If he is laid up in his father's house, his father must
see him." Phineas had not looked at the matter in that light; but he
thought that Miss Effingham might probably be right.
Early on the next morning he saw Mr. Bunce, and used all his
eloquence to keep that respectable member of society at home;--but
in vain. "What good do you expect to do, Mr. Bunce?" he said, with
perhaps some little tone of authority in his voice.
"To carry my point," said Bunce.
"And what is your point?"
"My present point is the ballot, as a part of the Government
measure."
"And you expect to carry that by going out into the streets with all
the roughs of London, and putting yourself in direct opposition to
the authority of the magistrates? Do you really believe that the
ballot will become the law of the land any sooner because you incur
this danger and inconvenience?"
"Look here, Mr. Finn; I don't believe the sea will become any fuller
because the Piddle runs into it out of the Dorsetshire fields; but I
do believe that the waters from all the countries is what makes the
ocean. I shall help; and it's my duty to help."
"It's your duty as a respectable citizen, with a wife and family, to
stay at home."
"If everybody with a wife and family was to say so, there'd be
none there but roughs, and then where should we be? What would the
Government people say to us then? If every man with a wife and family
was to show hisself in the streets to-night, we should have the
ballot before Parliament breaks up, and if none of 'em don't do it,
we shall never have the ballot. Ain't that so?" Phineas, who intended
to be honest, was not prepared to dispute the assertion on the spur
of the moment. "If that's so," said Bunce, triumphantly, "a man's
duty's clear enough. He ought to go, though he'd two wives and
families." And he went.
The petition was to be presented at six o'clock, but the crowd, who
collected to see it carried into Westminster Hall, began to form
itself by noon. It was said afterwards that many of the houses in
the neighbourhood of Palace Yard and the Bridge were filled with
soldiers; but if so, the men did not show themselves. In the course
of the evening three or four companies of the Guards in St. James's
Park did show themselves, and had some rough work to do, for many of
the people took themselves away from Westminster by that route. The
police, who were very numerous in Palace Yard, had a hard time of it
all the afternoon, and it was said afterwards that it would have been
much better to have allowed the petition to have been brought up by
the procession on Wednesday. A procession, let it be who it will that
proceeds, has in it, of its own nature something of order. But now
there was no order. The petition, which was said to fill fifteen
cabs,--though the absolute sheets of signatures were carried into
the House by four men,--was being dragged about half the day and it
certainly would have been impossible for a member to have made his
way into the House through Westminster Hall between the hours of four
and six. To effect an entrance at all they were obliged to go round
at the back of the Abbey, as all the spaces round St. Margaret's
Church and Canning's monument were filled with the crowd. Parliament
Street was quite impassable at five o clock, and there was no traffic
across the bridge from that hour till after eight. As the evening
went on, the mob extended itself to Downing Street and the front
of the Treasury Chambers, and before the night was over all the
hoardings round the new Government offices had been pulled down. The
windows also of certain obnoxious members of Parliament were broken,
when those obnoxious members lived within reach. One gentleman who
unfortunately held a house in Richmond Terrace, and who was said
to have said that the ballot was the resort of cowards, fared very
badly;--for his windows were not only broken, but his furniture and
mirrors were destroyed by the stones that were thrown. Mr. Mildmay,
I say, was much blamed. But after all, it may be a doubt whether the
procession on Wednesday might not have ended worse. Mr. Turnbull was
heard to say afterwards that the number of people collected would
have been much greater.
Mr. Mildmay moved the second reading of his bill, and made his
speech. He made his speech with the knowledge that the Houses of
Parliament were surrounded by a mob, and I think that the fact added
to its efficacy. It certainly gave him an appropriate opportunity
for a display which was not difficult. His voice faltered on two or
three occasions, and faltered through real feeling; but this sort of
feeling, though it be real, is at the command of orators on certain
occasions, and does them yeoman's service. Mr. Mildmay was an
old man, nearly worn out in the service of his country, who was
known to have been true and honest, and to have loved his country
well,--though there were of course they who declared that his
hand had been too weak for power, and that his services had been
naught;--and on this evening his virtues were remembered. Once when
his voice failed him the whole House got up and cheered. The nature
of a Whig Prime Minister's speech on such an occasion will be
understood by most of my readers without further indication. The bill
itself had been read before, and it was understood that no objection
would be made to the extent of the changes provided in it by the
liberal side of the House. The opposition coming from liberal members
was to be confined to the subject of the ballot. And even as yet
it was not known whether Mr. Turnbull and his followers would vote
against the second reading, or whether they would take what was
given, and declare their intention of obtaining the remainder on a
separate motion. The opposition of a large party of Conservatives was
a matter of certainty; but to this party Mr. Mildmay did not conceive
himself bound to offer so large an amount of argument as he would
have given had there been at the moment no crowd in Palace Yard. And
he probably felt that that crowd would assist him with his old Tory
enemies. When, in the last words of his speech, he declared that
under no circumstances would he disfigure the close of his political
career by voting for the ballot,--not though the people, on whose
behalf he had been fighting battles all his life, should be there in
any number to coerce him,--there came another round of applause from
the opposition benches, and Mr. Daubeny began to fear that some young
horses in his team might get loose from their traces. With great
dignity Mr. Daubeny had kept aloof from Mr. Turnbull and from Mr.
Turnbull's tactics; but he was not the less alive to the fact
that Mr. Turnbull, with his mob and his big petition, might be of
considerable assistance to him in this present duel between himself
and Mr. Mildmay. I think Mr. Daubeny was in the habit of looking at
these contests as duels between himself and the leader on the other
side of the House,--in which assistance from any quarter might be
accepted if offered.
Mr. Mildmay's speech did not occupy much over an hour, and at
half-past seven Mr. Turnbull got up to reply. It was presumed that he
would do so, and not a member left his place, though that time of the
day is an interesting time, and though Mr. Turnbull was accustomed to
be long. There soon came to be but little ground for doubting what
would be the nature of Mr. Turnbull's vote on the second reading.
"How may I dare," said he, "to accept so small a measure of reform as
this with such a message from the country as is now conveyed to me
through the presence of fifty thousand of my countrymen, who are at
this moment demanding their measure of reform just beyond the frail
walls of this chamber? The right honourable gentleman has told us
that he will never be intimidated by a concourse of people. I do not
know that there was any need that he should speak of intimidation.
No one has accused the right honourable gentleman of political
cowardice. But, as he has so said, I will follow in his footsteps.
Neither will I be intimidated by the large majority which this House
presented the other night against the wishes of the people. I will
support no great measure of reform which does not include the ballot
among its clauses." And so Mr. Turnbull threw down the gauntlet.
Mr. Turnbull spoke for two hours, and then the debate was adjourned
till the Monday. The adjournment was moved by an independent member,
who, as was known, would support the Government, and at once received
Mr. Turnbull's assent. There was no great hurry with the bill, and
it was felt that it would be well to let the ferment subside. Enough
had been done for glory when Mr. Mildmay moved the second reading,
and quite enough in the way of debate,--with such an audience almost
within hearing,--when Mr. Turnbull's speech had been made. Then the
House emptied itself at once. The elderly, cautious members made
their exit through the peers' door. The younger men got out into
the crowd through Westminster Hall, and were pushed about among the
roughs for an hour or so. Phineas, who made his way through the hall
with Laurence Fitzgibbon, found Mr. Turnbull's carriage waiting at
the entrance with a dozen policemen round it.
"I hope he won't get home to dinner before midnight," said Phineas.
"He understands all about it," said Laurence. "He had a good meal at
three, before he left home, and you'd find sandwiches and sherry in
plenty if you were to search his carriage. He knows how to remedy the
costs of mob popularity."
At that time poor Bunce was being hustled about in the crowd in the
vicinity of Mr. Turnbull's carriage. Phineas and Fitzgibbon made
their way out, and by degrees worked a passage for themselves into
Parliament Street. Mr. Turnbull had been somewhat behind them in
coming down the hall, and had not been without a sense of enjoyment
in the ovation which was being given to him. There can be no doubt
that he was wrong in what he was doing. That affair of the carriage
was altogether wrong, and did Mr. Turnbull much harm for many a day
afterwards. When he got outside the door, where were the twelve
policemen guarding his carriage, a great number of his admirers
endeavoured to shake hands with him. Among them was the devoted
Bunce. But the policemen seemed to think that Mr. Turnbull was to be
guarded, even from the affection of his friends, and were as careful
that he should be ushered into his carriage untouched, as though he
had been the favourite object of political aversion for the moment.
Mr. Turnbull himself, when he began to perceive that men were
crowding close upon the gates, and to hear the noise, and to feel, as
it were, the breath of the mob, stepped on quickly into his carriage.
He said a word or two in a loud voice. "Thank you, my friends. I
trust you may obtain all your just demands." But he did not pause
to speak. Indeed, he could hardly have done so, as the policemen
were manifestly in a hurry. The carriage was got away at a snail's
pace;--but there remained in the spot where the carriage had stood
the makings of a very pretty street row.
Bunce had striven hard to shake hands with his hero,--Bunce and some
other reformers as ardent and as decent as himself. The police were
very determinate that there should be no such interruption to their
programme for getting Mr. Turnbull off the scene. Mr. Bunce, who had
his own ideas as to his right to shake hands with any gentleman at
Westminster Hall who might choose to shake hands with him, became
uneasy under the impediments that were placed in his way, and
expressed himself warmly as to his civil rights. Now a London
policeman in a political row is, I believe, the most forbearing
of men. So long as he meets with no special political opposition,
ordinary ill-usage does not even put him out of temper. He is paid
for rough work among roughs, and takes his rubs gallantly. But he
feels himself to be an instrument for the moment of despotic power
as opposed to civil rights, and he won't stand what he calls "jaw."
Trip up a policeman in such a scramble, and he will take it in good
spirit; but mention the words "Habeas Corpus," and he'll lock you up
if he can. As a rule, his instincts are right; for the man who talks
about "Habeas Corpus" in a political crowd will generally do more
harm than can be effected by the tripping up of any constable. But
these instincts may be the means of individual injustice. I think
they were so when Mr. Bunce was arrested and kept a fast prisoner.
His wife had shown her knowledge of his character when she declared
that he'd be "took" if any one was "took."
Bunce was taken into custody with some three or four others like
himself,--decent men, who meant no harm, but who thought that as men
they were bound to show their political opinions, perhaps at the
expense of a little martyrdom,--and was carried into a temporary
stronghold, which had been provided for the necessities of the
police, under the clock-tower.
"Keep me, at your peril!" said Bunce, indignantly.
"We means it," said the sergeant who had him in custody.
"I've done no ha'porth to break the law," said Bunce.
"You was breaking the law when you was upsetting my men, as I saw
you," said the sergeant.
"I've upset nobody," said Bunce.
"Very well," rejoined the sergeant; "you can say it all before the
magistrate, to-morrow."
"And am I to be locked up all night?" said Bunce.
"I'm afraid you will," replied the sergeant.
Bunce, who was not by nature a very talkative man, said no more; but
he swore in his heart that there should be vengeance. Between eleven
and twelve he was taken to the regular police-station, and from
thence he was enabled to send word to his wife.
"Bunce has been taken," said she, with something of the tragic queen,
and something also of the injured wife in the tone of her voice, as
soon as Phineas let himself in with the latchkey between twelve and
one. And then, mingled with, and at last dominant over, those severer
tones, came the voice of the loving woman whose beloved one was in
trouble. "I knew how it'd be, Mr. Finn. Didn't I? And what must we
do? I don't suppose he'd had a bit to eat from the moment he went
out;--and as for a drop of beer, he never thinks of it, except what
I puts down for him at his meals. Them nasty police always take the
best. That's why I was so afeard."
Phineas said all that he could to comfort her, and promised to go
to the police-office early in the morning and look after Bunce. No
serious evil would, he thought, probably come of it; but still Bunce
had been wrong to go.
"But you might have been took yourself," argued Mrs. Bunce, "just as
well as he." Then Phineas explained that he had gone forth in the
execution of a public duty. "You might have been took, all the same,"
said Mrs. Bunce, "for I'm sure Bunce didn't do nothing amiss."
CHAPTER XXVI
"The First Speech"
On the following morning, which was Saturday, Phineas was early at
the police-office at Westminster looking after the interests of his
landlord; but there had been a considerable number of men taken up
during the row, and our friend could hardly procure that attention
for Mr. Bunce's case to which he thought the decency of his client
and his own position as a member of Parliament were entitled. The men
who had been taken up were taken in batches before the magistrates;
but as the soldiers in the park had been maltreated, and a
considerable injury had been done in the neighbourhood of Downing
Street, there was a good deal of strong feeling against the mob, and
the magistrates were disposed to be severe. If decent men chose to go
out among such companions, and thereby get into trouble, decent men
must take the consequences. During the Saturday and Sunday a very
strong feeling grew up against Mr. Turnbull. The story of the
carriage was told, and he was declared to be a turbulent demagogue,
only desirous of getting popularity. And together with this feeling
there arose a general verdict of "Serve them right" against all who
had come into contact with the police in the great Turnbull row; and
thus it came to pass that Mr. Bunce had not been liberated up to
the Monday morning. On the Sunday Mrs. Bunce was in hysterics, and
declared her conviction that Mr. Bunce would be imprisoned for life.
Poor Phineas had an unquiet time with her on the morning of that day.
In every ecstasy of her grief she threw herself into his arms, either
metaphorically or materially, according to the excess of her agony at
the moment, and expressed repeatedly an assured conviction that all
her children would die of starvation, and that she herself would be
picked up under the arches of one of the bridges. Phineas, who was
soft-hearted, did what he could to comfort her, and allowed himself
to be worked up to strong parliamentary anger against the magistrates
and police. "When they think that they have public opinion on their
side, there is nothing in the way or arbitrary excess which is too
great for them." This he said to Barrington Erle, who angered him and
increased the warmth of his feeling by declaring that a little close
confinement would be good for the Bunces of the day. "If we don't
keep the mob down, the mob will keep us down," said the Whig private
secretary. Phineas had no opportunity of answering this, but declared
to himself that Barrington Erle was no more a Liberal at heart than
was Mr. Daubeny. "He was born on that side of the question, and has
been receiving Whig wages all his life. That is the history of his
politics!"
On the Sunday afternoon Phineas went to Lord Brentford's in Portman
Square, intending to say a word or two about Lord Chiltern, and
meaning also to induce, if possible, the Cabinet Minister to take
part with him against the magistrates,--having a hope also, in which
he was not disappointed, that he might find Lady Laura Kennedy with
her father. He had come to understand that Lady Laura was not to be
visited at her own house on Sundays. So much indeed she had told
him in so many words. But he had come to understand also, without
any plain telling, that she rebelled in heart against this Sabbath
tyranny,--and that she would escape from it when escape was possible.
She had now come to talk to her father about her brother, and had
brought Violet Effingham with her. They had walked together across
the park after church, and intended to walk back again. Mr. Kennedy
did not like to have any carriage out on a Sunday, and to this
arrangement his wife made no objection.
Phineas had received a letter from the Stamford surgeon, and was able
to report favourably of Lord Chiltern. "The man says that he had
better not be moved for a month," said Phineas. "But that means
nothing. They always say that."
"Will it not be best for him to remain where he is?" said the Earl.
"He has not a soul to speak to," said Phineas.
"I wish I were with him," said his sister.
"That is, of course, out of the question," said the Earl. "They know
him at that inn, and it really seems to me best that he should stay
there. I do not think he would be so much at his ease here."
"It must be dreadful for a man to be confined to his room without
a creature near him, except the servants," said Violet. The Earl
frowned, but said nothing further. They all perceived that as soon as
he had learned that there was no real danger as to his son's life, he
was determined that this accident should not work him up to any show
of tenderness. "I do so hope he will come up to London," continued
Violet, who was not afraid of the Earl, and was determined not to be
put down.
"You don't know what you are talking about, my dear," said Lord
Brentford.
After this Phineas found it very difficult to extract any sympathy
from the Earl on behalf of the men who had been locked up. He was
moody and cross, and could not be induced to talk on the great
subject of the day. Violet Effingham declared that she did not care
how many Bunces were locked up; nor for how long,--adding, however,
a wish that Mr. Turnbull himself had been among the number of the
prisoners. Lady Laura was somewhat softer than this, and consented to
express pity in the case of Mr. Bunce himself; but Phineas perceived
that the pity was awarded to him and not to the sufferer. The feeling
against Mr. Turnbull was at the present moment so strong among all
the upper classes, that Mr. Bunce and his brethren might have been
kept in durance for a week without commiseration from them.
"It is very hard certainly on a man like Mr. Bunce," said Lady Laura.
"Why did not Mr. Bunce stay at home and mind his business?" said the
Earl.
Phineas spent the remainder of that day alone, and came to a
resolution that on the coming occasion he certainly would speak in
the House. The debate would be resumed on the Monday, and he would
rise to his legs on the very first moment that it became possible
for him to do so. And he would do nothing towards preparing a
speech;--nothing whatever. On this occasion he would trust entirely
to such words as might come to him at the moment;--ay, and to such
thoughts. He had before burdened his memory with preparations, and
the very weight of the burden had been too much for his mind. He had
feared to trust himself to speak, because he had felt that he was
not capable of performing the double labour of saying his lesson
by heart, and of facing the House for the first time. There should
be nothing now for him to remember. His thoughts were full of his
subject. He would support Mr. Mildmay's bill with all his eloquence,
but he would implore Mr. Mildmay, and the Home Secretary, and the
Government generally, to abstain from animosity against the populace
of London, because they desired one special boon which Mr. Mildmay
did not think that it was his duty to give them. He hoped that ideas
and words would come to him. Ideas and words had been free enough
with him in the old days of the Dublin debating society. If they
failed him now, he must give the thing up, and go back to Mr. Low.
On the Monday morning Phineas was for two hours at the police-court
in Westminster, and at about one on that day Mr. Bunce was liberated.
When he was brought up before the magistrate, Mr. Bunce spoke his
mind very freely as to the usage he had received, and declared his
intention of bringing an action against the sergeant who had detained
him. The magistrate, of course, took the part of the police, and
declared that, from the evidence of two men who were examined, Bunce
had certainly used such violence in the crowd as had justified his
arrest.
"I used no violence," said Bunce.
"According to your own showing, you endeavoured to make your way up
to Mr. Turnbull's carriage," said the magistrate.
"I was close to the carriage before the police even saw me," said
Bunce.
"But you tried to force your way round to the door."
"I used no force till a man had me by the collar to push me back; and
I wasn't violent, not then. I told him I was doing what I had a right
to do,--and it was that as made him hang on to me."
"You were not doing what you had a right to do. You were assisting to
create a riot," said the magistrate, with that indignation which a
London magistrate should always know how to affect.
Phineas, however, was allowed to give evidence as to his landlord's
character, and then Bunce was liberated. But before he went he
again swore that that should not be the last of it, and he told the
magistrate that he had been ill-used. When liberated, he was joined
by a dozen sympathising friends, who escorted him home, and among
them were one or two literary gentlemen, employed on those excellent
penny papers, the _People's Banner_ and the _Ballot-box_. It was
their intention that Mr. Bunce's case should not be allowed to sleep.
One of these gentlemen made a distinct offer to Phineas Finn of
unbounded popularity during life and of immortality afterwards,
if he, as a member of Parliament, would take up Bunce's case with
vigour. Phineas, not quite understanding the nature of the offer, and
not as yet knowing the profession of the gentleman, gave some general
reply.
"You come out strong, Mr. Finn, and we'll see that you are properly
reported. I'm on the _Banner_, sir, and I'll answer for that."
Phineas, who had been somewhat eager in expressing his sympathy
with Bunce, and had not given very close attention to the gentleman
who was addressing him, was still in the dark. The nature of the
_Banner_, which the gentleman was on, did not at once come home to
him.
"Something ought to be done, certainly," said Phineas.
"We shall take it up strong," said the gentleman, "and we shall be
happy to have you among us. You'll find, Mr. Finn, that in public
life there's nothing like having a horgan to back you. What is the
most you can do in the 'Ouse? Nothing, if you're not reported. You're
speaking to the country;--ain't you? And you can't do that without a
horgan, Mr. Finn. You come among us on the _Banner_, Mr. Finn. You
can't do better."
Then Phineas understood the nature of the offer made to him. As they
parted, the literary gentleman gave our hero his card. "Mr. Quintus
Slide." So much was printed. Then, on the corner of the card was
written, "_Banner_ Office, 137, Fetter Lane." Mr. Quintus Slide
was a young man, under thirty, not remarkable for clean linen, and
who always talked of the "'Ouse." But he was a well-known and not
undistinguished member of a powerful class of men. He had been a
reporter, and as such knew the "'Ouse" well, and was a writer for the
press. And, though he talked of "'Ouses" and "horgans", he wrote good
English with great rapidity, and was possessed of that special sort
of political fervour which shows itself in a man's work rather than
in his conduct. It was Mr. Slide's taste to be an advanced reformer,
and in all his operations on behalf of the _People's Banner_ he
was a reformer very much advanced. No man could do an article on the
people's indefeasible rights with more pronounced vigour than Mr.
Slide. But it had never occurred to him as yet that he ought to care
for anything else than the fight,--than the advantage of having a
good subject on which to write slashing articles. Mr. Slide was an
energetic but not a thoughtful man; but in his thoughts on politics,
as far as they went with him, he regarded the wrongs of the people as
being of infinitely greater value than their rights. It was not that
he was insincere in all that he was daily saying;--but simply that
he never thought about it. Very early in life he had fallen among
"people's friends," and an opening on the liberal press had come in
his way. To be a "people's friend" suited the turn of his ambition,
and he was a "people's friend." It was his business to abuse
Government, and to express on all occasions an opinion that as a
matter of course the ruling powers were the "people's enemies." Had
the ruling powers ceased to be the "people's enemies," Mr. Slide's
ground would have been taken from under his feet. But such a
catastrophe was out of the question. That excellent old arrangement
that had gone on since demagogues were first invented was in
full vigour. There were the ruling powers and there were the
people,--devils on one side and angels on the other,--and as long
as a people's friend had a pen in his hand all was right.
Phineas, when he left the indignant Bunce to go among his friends,
walked to the House thinking a good deal of what Mr. Slide had said
to him. The potted peas Committee was again on, and he had intended
to be in the Committee Room by twelve punctually: but he had been
unable to leave Mr. Bunce in the lurch, and it was now past one.
Indeed, he had, from one unfortunate circumstance after another,
failed hitherto in giving to the potted peas that resolute attention
which the subject demanded. On the present occasion his mind was full
of Mr. Quintus Slide and the _People's Banner_. After all, was there
not something in Mr. Slide's proposition? He, Phineas, had come into
Parliament as it were under the wing of a Government pack, and his
friendships, which had been very successful, had been made with
Ministers, and with the friends of Ministers. He had made up his mind
to be Whig Ministerial, and to look for his profession in that line.
He had been specially fortified in this resolution by his dislike
to the ballot,--which dislike had been the result of Mr. Monk's
teaching. Had Mr. Turnbull become his friend instead, it may well be
that he would have liked the ballot. On such subjects men must think
long, and be sure that they have thought in earnest, before they are
justified in saying that their opinions are the results of their
own thoughts. But now he began to reflect how far this ministerial
profession would suit him. Would it be much to be a Lord of the
Treasury, subject to the dominion of Mr. Ratler? Such lordship and
such subjection would be the result of success. He told himself
that he was at heart a true Liberal. Would it not be better for him
to abandon the idea of office trammels, and go among them on the
_People's Banner_? A glow of enthusiasm came over him as he thought
of it. But what would Violet Effingham say to the _People's Banner_
and Mr. Quintus Slide? And he would have liked the _Banner_ better
had not Mr. Slide talked about the 'Ouse.
From the Committee Room, in which, alas! he took no active part in
reference to the potted peas, he went down to the House, and was
present when the debate was resumed. Not unnaturally, one speaker
after another made some allusion to the row in the streets, and the
work which had fallen to the lot of the magistrates. Mr. Turnbull
had declared that he would vote against the second reading of Mr.
Mildmay's bill, and had explained that he would do so because he
could consent to no Reform Bill which did not include the ballot as
one of its measures. The debate fashioned itself after this speech of
Mr. Turnbull's, and turned again very much upon the ballot,--although
it had been thought that the late debate had settled that question.
One or two of Mr. Turnbull's followers declared that they also would
vote against the bill,--of course, as not going far enough; and one
or two gentlemen from the Conservative benches extended a spoken
welcome to these new colleagues. Then Mr. Palliser got up and
addressed the House for an hour, struggling hard to bring back the
real subject, and to make the House understand that the ballot,
whether good or bad, had been knocked on the head, and that members
had no right at the present moment to consider anything but the
expediency or inexpediency of so much Reform as Mr. Mildmay presented
to them in the present bill.
Phineas was determined to speak, and to speak on this evening if he
could catch the Speaker's eye. Again the scene before him was going
round before him; again things became dim, and again he felt his
blood beating hard at his heart. But things were not so bad with
him as they had been before, because he had nothing to remember. He
hardly knew, indeed, what he intended to say. He had an idea that he
was desirous of joining in earnest support of the measure, with a
vehement protest against the injustice which had been done to the
people in general, and to Mr. Bunce in particular. He had firmly
resolved that no fear of losing favour with the Government should
induce him to hold his tongue as to the Buncean cruelties. Sooner
than do so he would certainly "go among them" at the _Banner_ office.
He started up, wildly, when Mr. Palliser had completed his speech;
but the Speaker's eye, not unnaturally, had travelled to the other
side of the House, and there was a Tory of the old school upon his
legs,--Mr. Western, the member for East Barsetshire, one of the
gallant few who dared to vote against Sir Robert Peel's bill for
repealing the Corn Laws in 1846. Mr. Western spoke with a slow,
ponderous, unimpressive, but very audible voice, for some twenty
minutes, disdaining to make reference to Mr. Turnbull and his
politics, but pleading against any Reform, with all the old
arguments. Phineas did not hear a word that he said;--did not attempt
to hear. He was keen in his resolution to make another attempt at the
Speaker's eye, and at the present moment was thinking of that, and
of that only. He did not even give himself a moment's reflection as
to what his own speech should be. He would dash at it and take his
chance, resolved that at least he would not fail in courage. Twice he
was on his legs before Mr. Western had finished his slow harangue,
and twice he was compelled to reseat himself,--thinking that he had
subjected himself to ridicule. At last the member for East Barset sat
down, and Phineas was conscious that he had lost a moment or two in
presenting himself again to the Speaker.
He held his ground, however, though he saw that he had various rivals
for the right of speech. He held his ground, and was instantly aware
that he had gained his point. There was a slight pause, and as
some other urgent member did not reseat himself, Phineas heard the
president of that august assembly call upon himself to address the
House. The thing was now to be done. There he was with the House of
Commons at his feet,--a crowded House, bound to be his auditors as
long as he should think fit to address them, and reporters by tens
and twenties in the gallery ready and eager to let the country know
what the young member for Loughshane would say in this his maiden
speech.
Phineas Finn had sundry gifts, a powerful and pleasant voice, which
he had learned to modulate, a handsome presence, and a certain
natural mixture of modesty and self-reliance, which would certainly
protect him from the faults of arrogance and pomposity, and which,
perhaps, might carry him through the perils of his new position. And
he had also the great advantage of friends in the House who were
anxious that he should do well. But he had not that gift of slow
blood which on the former occasion would have enabled him to remember
his prepared speech, and which would now have placed all his own
resources within his own reach. He began with the expression of an
opinion that every true reformer ought to accept Mr. Mildmay's bill,
even if it were accepted only as an instalment,--but before he had
got through these sentences, he became painfully conscious that he
was repeating his own words.
He was cheered almost from the outset, and yet he knew as he went
on that he was failing. He had certain arguments at his fingers'
ends,--points with which he was, in truth, so familiar that he need
hardly have troubled himself to arrange them for special use,--and he
forgot even these. He found that he was going on with one platitude
after another as to the benefit of reform, in a manner that would
have shamed him six or seven years ago at a debating club. He pressed
on, fearing that words would fail him altogether if he paused;--but
he did in truth speak very much too fast, knocking his words together
so that no reporter could properly catch them. But he had nothing to
say for the bill except what hundreds had said before, and hundreds
would say again. Still he was cheered, and still he went on; and as
he became more and more conscious of his failure there grew upon him
the idea,--the dangerous hope, that he might still save himself from
ignominy by the eloquence of his invective against the police.
He tried it, and succeeded thoroughly in making the House understand
that he was very angry,--but he succeeded in nothing else. He could
not catch the words to express the thoughts of his mind. He could not
explain his idea that the people out of the House had as much right
to express their opinion in favour of the ballot as members in the
House had to express theirs against it; and that animosity had been
shown to the people by the authorities because they had so expressed
their opinion. Then he attempted to tell the story of Mr. Bunce in a
light and airy way, failed, and sat down in the middle of it. Again
he was cheered by all around him,--cheered as a new member is usually
cheered,--and in the midst of the cheer would have blown out his
brains had there been a pistol there ready for such an operation.
That hour with him was very bad. He did not know how to get up and
go away, or how to keep his place. For some time he sat with his
hat off, forgetful of his privilege of wearing it; and then put it
on hurriedly, as though the fact of his not wearing it must have
been observed by everybody. At last, at about two, the debate was
adjourned, and then as he was slowly leaving the House, thinking how
he might creep away without companionship, Mr. Monk took him by the
arm.
"Are you going to walk?" said Mr. Monk.
"Yes", said Phineas; "I shall walk."
"Then we may go together as far as Pall Mall. Come along." Phineas
had no means of escape, and left the House hanging on Mr. Monk's arm,
without a word. Nor did Mr. Monk speak till they were out in Palace
Yard. "It was not much amiss," said Mr. Monk; "but you'll do better
than that yet."
"Mr. Monk," said Phineas, "I have made an ass of myself so
thoroughly, that there will at any rate be this good result, that I
shall never make an ass of myself again after the same fashion."
"Ah!--I thought you had some such feeling as that, and therefore I
was determined to speak to you. You may be sure, Finn, that I do not
care to flatter you, and I think you ought to know that, as far as I
am able, I will tell you the truth. Your speech, which was certainly
nothing great, was about on a par with other maiden speeches in the
House of Commons. You have done yourself neither good nor harm. Nor
was it desirable that you should. My advice to you now is, never to
avoid speaking on any subject that interests you, but never to speak
for above three minutes till you find yourself as much at home on
your legs as you are when sitting. But do not suppose that you have
made an ass of yourself,--that is, in any special degree. Now,
good-night."
CHAPTER XXVII
Phineas Discussed
Lady Laura Kennedy heard two accounts of her friend's speech,--and
both from men who had been present. Her husband was in his place, in
accordance with his constant practice, and Lord Brentford had been
seated, perhaps unfortunately, in the peers' gallery.
"And you think it was a failure?" Lady Laura said to her husband.
"It certainly was not a success. There was nothing particular about
it. There was a good deal of it you could hardly hear."
After that she got the morning newspapers, and turned with great
interest to the report. Phineas Finn had been, as it were, adopted by
her as her own political offspring,--or at any rate as her political
godchild. She had made promises on his behalf to various personages
of high political standing,--to her father, to Mr. Monk, to the Duke
of St. Bungay, and even to Mr. Mildmay himself. She had thoroughly
intended that Phineas Finn should be a political success from the
first; and since her marriage, she had, I think, been more intent
upon it than before. Perhaps there was a feeling on her part that
having wronged him in one way, she would repay him in another. She
had become so eager for his success,--for a while scorning to conceal
her feeling,--that her husband had unconsciously begun to entertain
a dislike to her eagerness. We know how quickly women arrive at an
understanding of the feelings of those with whom they live; and now,
on that very occasion, Lady Laura perceived that her husband did not
take in good part her anxiety on behalf of her friend. She saw that
it was so as she turned over the newspaper looking for the report of
the speech. It was given in six lines, and at the end of it there was
an intimation,--expressed in the shape of advice,--that the young
orator had better speak more slowly if he wished to be efficacious
either with the House or with the country.
"He seems to have been cheered a good deal," said Lady Laura.
"All members are cheered at their first speech," said Mr. Kennedy.
"I've no doubt he'll do well yet," said Lady Laura.
"Very likely," said Mr. Kennedy. Then he turned to his newspaper, and
did not take his eyes off it as long as his wife remained with him.
Later in the day Lady Laura saw her father, and Miss Effingham was
with her at the time. Lord Brentford said something which indicated
that he had heard the debate on the previous evening, and Lady Laura
instantly began to ask him about Phineas.
"The less said the better," was the Earl's reply.
"Do you mean that it was so bad as that?" asked Lady Laura.
"It was not very bad at first;--though indeed nobody could say it was
very good. But he got himself into a mess about the police and the
magistrates before he had done, and nothing but the kindly feeling
always shown to a first effort saved him from being coughed down."
Lady Laura had not a word more to say about Phineas to her father;
but, womanlike, she resolved that she would not abandon him. How
many first failures in the world had been the precursors of ultimate
success! "Mildmay will lose his bill," said the Earl, sorrowfully.
"There does not seem to be a doubt about that."
"And what will you all do?" asked Lady Laura.
"We must go to the country, I suppose," said the Earl.
"What's the use? You can't have a more liberal House than you have
now," said Lady Laura.
"We may have one less liberal,--or rather less radical,--with fewer
men to support Mr. Turnbull. I do not see what else we can do. They
say that there are no less than twenty-seven men on our side of the
House who will either vote with Turnbull against us, or will decline
to vote at all."
"Every one of them ought to lose his seat," said Lady Laura.
"But what can we do? How is the Queen's Government to be carried on?"
We all know the sad earnestness which impressed itself on the Earl's
brow as he asked these momentous questions. "I don't suppose that Mr.
Turnbull can form a Ministry."
"With Mr. Daubeny as whipper-in, perhaps he might," said Lady Laura.
"And will Mr. Finn lose his seat?" asked Violet Effingham. "Most
probably," said the Earl. "He only got it by an accident."
"You must find him a seat somewhere in England," said Violet.
"That might be difficult," said the Earl, who then left the room.
The two women remained together for some quarter of an hour before
they spoke again. Then Lady Laura said something about her brother.
"If there be a dissolution, I hope Oswald will stand for Loughton."
Loughton was a borough close to Saulsby, in which, as regarded its
political interests, Lord Brentford was supposed to have considerable
influence. To this Violet said nothing. "It is quite time," continued
Lady Laura, "that old Mr. Standish should give way. He has had the
seat for twenty-five years, and has never done anything, and he
seldom goes to the House now."
"He is not your uncle, is he?"
"No; he is papa's cousin; but he is ever so much older than
papa;--nearly eighty, I believe."
"Would not that be just the place for Mr. Finn?" said Violet.
Then Lady Laura became very serious. "Oswald would of course have a
better right to it than anybody else."
"But would Lord Chiltern go into Parliament? I have heard him declare
that he would not."
"If we could get papa to ask him, I think he would change his mind,"
said Lady Laura.
There was again silence for a few moments, after which Violet
returned to the original subject of their conversation. "It would be
a thousand pities that Mr. Finn should be turned out into the cold.
Don't you think so?"
"I, for one, should be very sorry."
"So should I,--and the more so from what Lord Brentford says about
his not speaking well last night. I don't think that it is very much
of an accomplishment for a gentleman to speak well. Mr. Turnbull, I
suppose, speaks well; and they say that that horrid man, Mr. Bonteen,
can talk by the hour together. I don't think that it shows a man to
be clever at all. But I believe Mr. Finn would do it, if he set his
mind to it, and I shall think it a great shame if they turn him out."
"It would depend very much, I suppose, on Lord Tulla."
"I don't know anything about Lord Tulla," said Violet; "but I'm quite
sure that he might have Loughton, if we manage it properly. Of course
Lord Chiltern should have it if he wants it, but I don't think he
will stand in Mr. Finn's way."
"I'm afraid it's out of the question," said Lady Laura, gravely.
"Papa thinks so much about the borough." The reader will remember
that both Lord Brentford and his daughter were thorough reformers!
The use of a little borough of his own, however, is a convenience to
a great peer.
"Those difficult things have always to be talked of for a long while,
and then they become easy," said Violet. "I believe if you were
to propose to Mr. Kennedy to give all his property to the Church
Missionaries and emigrate to New Zealand, he'd begin to consider it
seriously after a time."
"I shall not try, at any rate."
"Because you don't want to go to New Zealand;--but you might try
about Loughton for poor Mr. Finn."
"Violet," said Lady Laura, after a moment's pause;--and she spoke
sharply; "Violet, I believe you are in love with Mr. Finn."
"That's just like you, Laura."
"I never made such an accusation against you before, or against
anybody else that I can remember. But I do begin to believe that you
are in love with Mr. Finn."
"Why shouldn't I be in love with him, if I like?"
"I say nothing about that;--only he has not got a penny."
"But I have, my dear."
"And I doubt whether you have any reason for supposing that he is in
love with you."
"That would be my affair, my dear."
"Then you are in love with him?"
"That is my affair also."
Lady Laura shrugged her shoulders. "Of course it is; and if you tell
me to hold my tongue, of course I will do so. If you ask me whether I
think it a good match, of course I must say I do not."
"I don't tell you to hold your tongue, and I don't ask you what you
think about the match. You are quite welcome to talk as much about me
as you please;--but as to Mr. Phineas Finn, you have no business to
think anything."
"I shouldn't talk to anybody but yourself."
"I am growing to be quite indifferent as to what people say. Lady
Baldock asked me the other day whether I was going to throw myself
away on Mr. Laurence Fitzgibbon."
"No!"
"Indeed she did."
"And what did you answer?"
"I told her that it was not quite settled; but that as I had only
spoken to him once during the last two years, and then for not more
than half a minute, and as I wasn't sure whether I knew him by sight,
and as I had reason to suppose he didn't know my name, there might,
perhaps, be a delay of a week or two before the thing came off. Then
she flounced out of the room."
"But what made her ask about Mr. Fitzgibbon?"
"Somebody had been hoaxing her. I am beginning to think that Augusta
does it for her private amusement. If so, I shall think more highly
of my dear cousin than I have hitherto done. But, Laura, as you
have made a similar accusation against me, and as I cannot get out
of it with you as I do with my aunt, I must ask you to hear my
protestation. I am not in love with Mr. Phineas Finn. Heaven help
me;--as far as I can tell, I am not in love with any one, and never
shall be." Lady Laura looked pleased. "Do you know," continued
Violet, "that I think I could be in love with Mr. Phineas Finn, if
I could be in love with anybody?" Then Lady Laura looked displeased.
"In the first place, he is a gentleman," continued Violet. "Then he
is a man of spirit. And then he has not too much spirit;--not that
kind of spirit which makes some men think that they are the finest
things going. His manners are perfect;--not Chesterfieldian, and yet
never offensive. He never browbeats any one, and never toadies any
one. He knows how to live easily with men of all ranks, without any
appearance of claiming a special status for himself. If he were made
Archbishop of Canterbury to-morrow, I believe he would settle down
into the place of the first subject in the land without arrogance,
and without false shame."
"You are his eulogist with a vengeance."
"I am his eulogist; but I am not in love with him. If he were to
ask me to be his wife to-morrow, I should be distressed, and should
refuse him. If he were to marry my dearest friend in the world, I
should tell him to kiss me and be my brother. As to Mr. Phineas
Finn,--those are my sentiments."
"What you say is very odd."
"Why odd?"
"Simply because mine are the same."
"Are they the same? I once thought, Laura, that you did love
him;--that you meant to be his wife."
Lady Laura sat for a while without making any reply to this. She
sat with her elbow on the table and with her face leaning on her
hand,--thinking how far it would tend to her comfort if she spoke in
true confidence. Violet during the time never took her eyes from her
friend's face, but remained silent as though waiting for an answer.
She had been very explicit as to her feelings. Would Laura Kennedy be
equally explicit? She was too clever to forget that such plainness
of speech would be, must be more difficult to Lady Laura than to
herself. Lady Laura was a married woman; but she felt that her friend
would have been wrong to search for secrets, unless she were ready to
tell her own. It was probably some such feeling which made Lady Laura
speak at last.
"So I did, nearly--" said Lady Laura; "very nearly. You told me just
now that you had money, and could therefore do as you pleased. I had
no money, and could not do as I pleased."
"And you told me also that I had no reason for thinking that he cared
for me."
"Did I? Well;--I suppose you have no reason. He did care for me. He
did love me."
"He told you so?"
"Yes;--he told me so."
"And how did you answer him?"
"I had that very morning become engaged to Mr. Kennedy. That was my
answer."
"And what did he say when you told him?"
"I do not know. I cannot remember. But he behaved very well."
"And now,--if he were to love me, you would grudge me his love?"
"Not for that reason,--not if I know myself. Oh no! I would not be so
selfish as that."
"For what reason then?"
"Because I look upon it as written in heaven that you are to be
Oswald's wife."
"Heaven's writings then are false," said Violet, getting up and
walking away.
In the meantime Phineas was very wretched at home. When he reached
his lodgings after leaving the House,--after his short conversation
with Mr. Monk,--he tried to comfort himself with what that gentleman
had said to him. For a while, while he was walking, there had been
some comfort in Mr. Monk's words. Mr. Monk had much experience, and
doubtless knew what he was saying,--and there might yet be hope. But
all this hope faded away when Phineas was in his own rooms. There
came upon him, as he looked round them, an idea that he had no
business to be in Parliament, that he was an impostor, that he was
going about the world under false pretences, and that he would never
set himself aright, even unto himself, till he had gone through some
terrible act of humiliation. He had been a cheat even to Mr. Quintus
Slide of the _Banner_, in accepting an invitation to come among
them. He had been a cheat to Lady Laura, in that he had induced
her to think that he was fit to live with her. He was a cheat to
Violet Effingham, in assuming that he was capable of making himself
agreeable to her. He was a cheat to Lord Chiltern when riding his
horses, and pretending to be a proper associate for a man of fortune.
Why,--what was his income? What his birth? What his proper position?
And now he had got the reward which all cheats deserve. Then he went
to bed, and as he lay there, he thought of Mary Flood Jones. Had he
plighted his troth to Mary, and then worked like a slave under Mr.
Low's auspices,--he would not have been a cheat.
It seemed to him that he had hardly been asleep when the girl
came into his room in the morning. "Sir," said she, "there's that
gentleman there."
"What gentleman?"
"The old gentleman."
Then Phineas knew that Mr. Clarkson was in his sitting-room, and
that he would not leave it till he had seen the owner of the room.
Nay,--Phineas was pretty sure that Mr. Clarkson would come into the
bedroom, if he were kept long waiting. "Damn the old gentleman," said
Phineas in his wrath;--and the maid-servant heard him say so.
In about twenty minutes he went out into the sitting-room, with
his slippers on and in his dressing-gown. Suffering under the
circumstances of such an emergency, how is any man to go through the
work of dressing and washing with proper exactness? As to the prayers
which he said on that morning, I think that no question should be
asked. He came out with a black cloud on his brow, and with his mind
half made up to kick Mr. Clarkson out of the room. Mr. Clarkson, when
he saw him, moved his chin round within his white cravat, as was a
custom with him, and put his thumb and forefinger on his lips, and
then shook his head.
"Very bad, Mr. Finn; very bad indeed; very bad, ain't it?"
"You coming here in this way at all times in the day is very bad,"
said Phineas.
"And where would you have me go? Would you like to see me down in the
lobby of the House?"
"To tell you the truth, Mr. Clarkson, I don't want to see you
anywhere."
"Ah; yes; I daresay! And that's what you call honest, being a
Parliament gent! You had my money, and then you tell me you don't
want to see me any more!"
"I have not had your money," said Phineas.
"But let me tell you," continued Mr. Clarkson, "that I want to see
you;--and shall go on seeing you till the money is paid."
"I've not had any of your money," said Phineas.
Mr. Clarkson again twitched his chin about on the top of his cravat
and smiled. "Mr. Finn," said he, showing the bill, "is that your
name?"
"Yes, it is."
"Then I want my money."
"I have no money to give you."
"Do be punctual now. Why ain't you punctual? I'd do anything for you
if you were punctual. I would indeed." Mr. Clarkson, as he said this,
sat down in the chair which had been placed for our hero's breakfast,
and cutting a slice off the loaf, began to butter it with great
composure.
"Mr. Clarkson," said Phineas, "I cannot ask you to breakfast here. I
am engaged."
"I'll just take a bit of bread and butter all the same," said
Clarkson. "Where do you get your butter? Now I could tell you a woman
who'd give it you cheaper and a deal better than this. This is all
lard. Shall I send her to you?"
"No," said Phineas. There was no tea ready, and therefore Mr.
Clarkson emptied the milk into a cup and drank it. "After this," said
Phineas, "I must beg, Mr. Clarkson, that you will never come to my
room any more. I shall not be at home to you."
"The lobby of the House is the same thing to me," said Mr. Clarkson.
"They know me there well. I wish you'd be punctual, and then we'd be
the best of friends." After that Mr. Clarkson, having finished his
bread and butter, took his leave.
CHAPTER XXVIII
The Second Reading Is Carried
The debate on the bill was prolonged during the whole of that week.
Lord Brentford, who loved his seat in the Cabinet and the glory of
being a Minister, better even than he loved his borough, had taken
a gloomy estimate when he spoke of twenty-seven defaulters, and of
the bill as certainly lost. Men who were better able than he to make
estimates,--the Bonteens and Fitzgibbons on each side of the House,
and above all, the Ratlers and Robys, produced lists from day to
day which varied now by three names in one direction, then by two
in another, and which fluctuated at last by units only. They all
concurred in declaring that it would be a very near division. A great
effort was made to close the debate on the Friday, but it failed, and
the full tide of speech was carried on till the following Monday. On
that morning Phineas heard Mr. Ratler declare at the club that, as
far as his judgment went, the division at that moment was a fair
subject for a bet. "There are two men doubtful in the House," said
Ratler, "and if one votes on one side and one on the other, or if
neither votes at all, it will be a tie." Mr. Roby, however, the
whip on the other side, was quite sure that one at least of these
gentlemen would go into his lobby, and that the other would not go
into Mr. Ratler's lobby. I am inclined to think that the town was
generally inclined to put more confidence in the accuracy of Mr. Roby
than in that of Mr. Ratler; and among betting men there certainly
was a point given by those who backed the Conservatives. The odds,
however, were lost, for on the division the numbers in the two
lobbies were equal, and the Speaker gave his casting vote in favour
of the Government. The bill was read a second time, and was lost, as
a matter of course, in reference to any subsequent action. Mr. Roby
declared that even Mr. Mildmay could not go on with nothing but the
Speaker's vote to support him. Mr. Mildmay had no doubt felt that he
could not go on with his bill from the moment in which Mr. Turnbull
had declared his opposition; but he could not with propriety withdraw
it in deference to Mr. Turnbull's opinion.
During the week Phineas had had his hands sufficiently full. Twice he
had gone to the potted peas inquiry; but he had been at the office
of the _People's Banner_ more often than that. Bunce had been very
resolute in his determination to bring an action against the police
for false imprisonment, even though he spent every shilling of his
savings in doing so. And when his wife, in the presence of Phineas,
begged that bygones might be bygones, reminding him that spilt milk
could not be recovered, he called her a mean-spirited woman. Then
Mrs. Bunce wept a flood of tears, and told her favourite lodger that
for her all comfort in this world was over. "Drat the reformers, I
say. And I wish there was no Parliament; so I do. What's the use of
all the voting, when it means nothing but dry bread and cross words?"
Phineas by no means encouraged his landlord in his litigious spirit,
advising him rather to keep his money in his pocket, and leave the
fighting of the battle to the columns of the _Banner_,--which would
fight it, at any rate, with economy. But Bunce, though he delighted
in the _Banner_, and showed an unfortunate readiness to sit at the
feet of Mr. Quintus Slide, would have his action at law;--in which
resolution Mr. Slide did, I fear, encourage him behind the back of
his better friend, Phineas Finn.
Phineas went with Bunce to Mr. Low's chambers,--for Mr. Low had in
some way become acquainted with the law-stationer's journeyman,--and
there some very good advice was given. "Have you asked yourself what
is your object, Mr. Bunce?" said Mr. Low. Mr. Bunce declared he had
asked himself that question, and had answered it. His object was
redress. "In the shape of compensation to yourself," suggested Mr.
Low. No; Mr. Bunce would not admit that he personally required any
compensation. The redress wanted was punishment to the man. "Is it
for vengeance?" asked Mr. Low. No; it was not for vengeance, Mr.
Bunce declared. "It ought not to be," continued Mr. Low; "because,
though you think that the man exceeded in his duty, you must feel
that he was doing so through no personal ill-will to yourself."
"What I want is, to have the fellows kept in their proper places,"
said Mr. Bunce.
"Exactly;--and therefore these things, when they occur, are mentioned
in the press and in Parliament,--and the attention of a Secretary of
State is called to them. Thank God, we don't have very much of that
kind of thing in England."
"Maybe we shall have more if we don't look to it," said Bunce
stoutly.
"We always are looking to it," said Mr. Low;--"looking to it very
carefully. But I don't think anything is to be done in that way by
indictment against a single man, whose conduct has been already
approved by the magistrates. If you want notoriety, Mr. Bunce, and
don't mind what you pay for it; or have got anybody else to pay for
it; then indeed--"
"There ain't nobody to pay for it," said Bunce, waxing angry.
"Then I certainly should not pay for it myself if I were you," said
Mr. Low.
But Bunce was not to be counselled out of his intention. When he was
out in the square with Phineas he expressed great anger against Mr.
Low. "He don't know what patriotism means," said the law scrivener.
"And then he talks to me about notoriety! It has always been the
same way with 'em. If a man shows a spark of public feeling, it's
all hambition. I don't want no notoriety. I wants to earn my bread
peaceable, and to be let alone when I'm about my own business. I pays
rates for the police to look after rogues, not to haul folks about
and lock 'em up for days and nights, who is doing what they has a
legal right to do." After that, Bunce went to his attorney, to the
great detriment of the business at the stationer's shop, and Phineas
visited the office of the _People's Banner_. There he wrote a leading
article about Bunce's case, for which he was in due time to be paid
a guinea. After all, the _People's Banner_ might do more for him in
this way than ever would be done by Parliament. Mr. Slide, however,
and another gentleman at the _Banner_ office, much older than Mr.
Slide, who announced himself as the actual editor, were anxious that
Phineas should rid himself of his heterodox political resolutions
about the ballot. It was not that they cared much about his own
opinions; and when Phineas attempted to argue with the editor on the
merits of the ballot, the editor put him down very shortly. "We go in
for it, Mr. Finn," he said. If Mr. Finn would go in for it too, the
editor seemed to think that Mr. Finn might make himself very useful
at the _Banner_ Office. Phineas stoutly maintained that this was
impossible,--and was therefore driven to confine his articles in the
service of the people to those open subjects on which his opinions
agreed with those of the _People's Banner_. This was his second
article, and the editor seemed to think that, backward as he was
about the ballot, he was too useful an aid to be thrown aside. A
member of Parliament is not now all that he was once, but still there
is a prestige in the letters affixed to his name which makes him loom
larger in the eyes of the world than other men. Get into Parliament,
if it be but for the borough of Loughshane, and the _People's
Banners_ all round will be glad of your assistance, as will also
companies limited and unlimited to a very marvellous extent. Phineas
wrote his article and promised to look in again, and so they went
on. Mr. Quintus Slide continued to assure him that a "horgan" was
indispensable to him, and Phineas began to accommodate his ears to
the sound which had at first been so disagreeable. He found that his
acquaintance, Mr. Slide, had ideas of his own as to getting into
the 'Ouse at some future time. "I always look upon the 'Ouse as my
oyster, and 'ere's my sword," said Mr. Slide, brandishing an old
quill pen. "And I feel that if once there I could get along. I do
indeed. What is it a man wants? It's only pluck,--that he shouldn't
funk because a 'undred other men are looking at him." Then Phineas
asked him whether he had any idea of a constituency, to which Mr.
Slide replied that he had no absolutely formed intention. Many
boroughs, however, would doubtless be set free from aristocratic
influence by the redistribution of seats which must take place, as
Mr. Slide declared, at any rate in the next session. Then he named
the borough of Loughton; and Phineas Finn, thinking of Saulsby,
thinking of the Earl, thinking of Lady Laura, and thinking of Violet,
walked away disgusted. Would it not be better that the quiet town,
clustering close round the walls of Saulsby, should remain as it was,
than that it should be polluted by the presence of Mr. Quintus Slide?
On the last day of the debate, at a few moments before four o'clock,
Phineas encountered another terrible misfortune. He had been at the
potted peas since twelve, and had on this occasion targed two or
three commissariat officers very tightly with questions respecting
cabbages and potatoes, and had asked whether the officers on board
a certain ship did not always eat preserved asparagus while the men
had not even a bean. I fear that he had been put up to this business
by Mr. Quintus Slide, and that he made himself nasty. There was,
however, so much nastiness of the kind going, that his little effort
made no great difference. The conservative members of the Committee,
on whose side of the House the inquiry had originated, did not
scruple to lay all manner of charges to officers whom, were they
themselves in power, they would be bound to support and would support
with all their energies. About a quarter before four the members of
the Committee had dismissed their last witness for the day, being
desirous of not losing their chance of seats on so important an
occasion, and hurried down into the lobby,--so that they might enter
the House before prayers. Phineas here was button-holed by Barrington
Erle, who said something to him as to the approaching division. They
were standing in front of the door of the House, almost in the middle
of the lobby, with a crowd of members around them,--on a spot which,
as frequenters know, is hallowed ground, and must not be trodden by
strangers. He was in the act of answering Erle, when he was touched
on the arm, and on turning round, saw Mr. Clarkson. "About that
little bill, Mr. Finn," said the horrible man, turning his chin round
over his white cravat. "They always tell me at your lodgings that
you ain't at home." By this time a policeman was explaining to Mr.
Clarkson with gentle violence that he must not stand there,--that he
must go aside into one of the corners. "I know all that," said Mr.
Clarkson, retreating. "Of course I do. But what is a man to do when a
gent won't see him at home?" Mr. Clarkson stood aside in his corner
quietly, giving the policeman no occasion for further action against
him; but in retreating he spoke loud, and there was a lull of voices
around, and twenty members at least had heard what had been said.
Phineas Finn no doubt had his privilege, but Mr. Clarkson was
determined that the privilege should avail him as little as possible.
It was very hard. The real offender, the Lord of the Treasury, the
peer's son, with a thousand a year paid by the country was not
treated with this cruel persecution. Phineas had in truth never taken
a farthing from any one but his father; and though doubtless he owed
something at this moment, he had no creditor of his own that was even
angry with him. As the world goes he was a clear man,--but for this
debt of his friend Fitzgibbon. He left Barrington Erle in the lobby,
and hurried into the House, blushing up to the eyes. He looked for
Fitzgibbon in his place, but the Lord of the Treasury was not as yet
there. Doubtless he would be there for the division, and Phineas
resolved that he would speak a bit of his mind before he let his
friend out of his sight.
There were some great speeches made on that evening. Mr. Gresham
delivered an oration of which men said that it would be known in
England as long as there were any words remaining of English
eloquence. In it he taunted Mr. Turnbull with being a recreant to
the people, of whom he called himself so often the champion. But Mr.
Turnbull was not in the least moved. Mr. Gresham knew well enough
that Mr. Turnbull was not to be moved by any words;--but the words
were not the less telling to the House and to the country. Men, who
heard it, said that Mr. Gresham forgot himself in that speech, forgot
his party, forgot his strategy, forgot his long-drawn schemes,--even
his love of applause, and thought only of his cause. Mr. Daubeny
replied to him with equal genius, and with equal skill,--if not with
equal heart. Mr. Gresham had asked for the approbation of all present
and of all future reformers. Mr. Daubeny denied him both,--the one
because he would not succeed, and the other because he would not have
deserved success. Then Mr. Mildmay made his reply, getting up at
about three o'clock, and uttered a prayer,--a futile prayer,--that
this his last work on behalf of his countrymen might be successful.
His bill was read a second time, as I have said before, in obedience
to the casting vote of the Speaker,--but a majority such as that was
tantamount to a defeat.
There was, of course, on that night no declaration as to what
ministers would do. Without a meeting of the Cabinet, and without
some further consideration, though each might know that the bill
would be withdrawn, they could not say in what way they would act.
But late as was the hour, there were many words on the subject before
members were in their beds. Mr. Turnbull and Mr. Monk left the House
together, and perhaps no two gentlemen in it had in former sessions
been more in the habit of walking home arm-in-arm and discussing what
each had heard and what each had said in that assembly. Latterly
these two men had gone strangely asunder in their paths,--very
strangely for men who had for years walked so closely together. And
this separation had been marked by violent words spoken against each
other,--by violent words, at least, spoken against him in office by
the one who had never contaminated his hands by the Queen's shilling.
And yet, on such an occasion as this, they were able to walk away
from the House arm-in-arm, and did not fly at each other's throat by
the way.
"Singular enough, is it not," said Mr. Turnbull, "that the thing
should have been so close?"
"Very odd," said Mr. Monk; "but men have said that it would be so all
the week."
"Gresham was very fine," said Mr. Turnbull.
"Very fine, indeed. I never have heard anything like it before."
"Daubeny was very powerful too," said Mr. Turnbull.
"Yes;--no doubt. The occasion was great, and he answered to the spur.
But Gresham's was the speech of the debate."
"Well;--yes; perhaps it was," said Mr. Turnbull, who was thinking of
his own flight the other night, and who among his special friends had
been much praised for what he had then done. But of course he made
no allusion to his own doings,--or to those of Mr. Monk. In this way
they conversed for some twenty minutes, till they parted; but neither
of them interrogated the other as to what either might be called upon
to do in consequence of the division which had just been effected.
They might still be intimate friends, but the days of confidence
between them were passed.
Phineas had seen Laurence Fitzgibbon enter the House,--which he did
quite late in the night, so as to be in time for the division. No
doubt he had dined in the House, and had been all the evening in the
library,--or in the smoking-room. When Mr. Mildmay was on his legs
making his reply, Fitzgibbon had sauntered in, not choosing to wait
till he might be rung up by the bell at the last moment. Phineas was
near him as they passed by the tellers, near him in the lobby, and
near him again as they all passed back into the House. But at the
last moment he thought that he would miss his prey. In the crowd
as they left the House he failed to get his hand upon his friend's
shoulder. But he hurried down the members' passage, and just at the
gate leading out into Westminster Hall he overtook Fitzgibbon walking
arm-in-arm with Barrington Erle.
"Laurence," he said, taking hold of his countryman's arm with a
decided grasp, "I want to speak to you for a moment, if you please."
"Speak away," said Laurence. Then Phineas, looking up into his face,
knew very well that he had been--what the world calls, dining.
Phineas remembered at the moment that Barrington Erle had been close
to him when the odious money-lender had touched his arm and made
his inquiry about that "little bill." He much wished to make Erle
understand that the debt was not his own,--that he was not in the
hands of usurers in reference to his own concerns. But there was a
feeling within him that he still,--even still,--owed something to his
friendship to Fitzgibbon. "Just give me your arm, and come on with me
for a minute," said Phineas. "Erle will excuse us."
"Oh, blazes!" said Laurence, "what is it you're after? I ain't good
at private conferences at three in the morning. We're all out, and
isn't that enough for ye?"
"I have been dreadfully annoyed to-night," said Phineas, "and I
wished to speak to you about it."
"Bedad, Finn, my boy, and there are a good many of us are
annoyed;--eh, Barrington?"
Phineas perceived clearly that though Fitzgibbon had been dining,
there was as much of cunning in all this as of wine, and he was
determined not to submit to such unlimited ill-usage. "My annoyance
comes from your friend, Mr. Clarkson, who had the impudence to
address me in the lobby of the House."
"And serve you right, too, Finn, my boy. Why the devil did you sport
your oak to him? He has told me all about it. There ain't such a
patient little fellow as Clarkson anywhere, if you'll only let him
have his own way. He'll look in, as he calls it, three times a week
for a whole season, and do nothing further. Of course he don't like
to be locked out."
"Is that the gentleman with whom the police interfered in the lobby?"
Erle inquired.
"A confounded bill discounter to whom our friend here has introduced
me,--for his own purposes," said Phineas.
"A very gentleman-like fellow," said Laurence. "Barrington knows
him, I daresay. Look here, Finn, my boy, take my advice. Ask him to
breakfast, and let him understand that the house will always be open
to him." After this Laurence Fitzgibbon and Barrington Erle got into
a cab together, and were driven away.
CHAPTER XXIX
A Cabinet Meeting
And now will the Muses assist me while I sing an altogether new song?
On the Tuesday the Cabinet met at the First Lord's official residence
in Downing Street, and I will attempt to describe what, according to
the bewildered brain of a poor fictionist, was said or might have
been said, what was done or might have been done, on so august an
occasion.
The poor fictionist very frequently finds himself to have been wrong
in his description of things in general, and is told so, roughly by
the critics, and tenderly by the friends of his bosom. He is moved
to tell of things of which he omits to learn the nature before he
tells of them--as should be done by a strictly honest fictionist. He
catches salmon in October; or shoots his partridges in March. His
dahlias bloom in June, and his birds sing in the autumn. He opens the
opera-houses before Easter, and makes Parliament sit on a Wednesday
evening. And then those terrible meshes of the Law! How is a
fictionist, in these excited days, to create the needed biting
interest without legal difficulties; and how again is he to steer his
little bark clear of so many rocks,--when the rocks and the shoals
have been purposely arranged to make the taking of a pilot on board a
necessity? As to those law meshes, a benevolent pilot will, indeed,
now and again give a poor fictionist a helping hand,--not used,
however, generally, with much discretion. But from whom is any
assistance to come in the august matter of a Cabinet assembly? There
can be no such assistance. No man can tell aught but they who will
tell nothing. But then, again, there is this safety, that let the
story be ever so mistold,--let the fiction be ever so far removed
from the truth, no critic short of a Cabinet Minister himself can
convict the narrator of error.
It was a large dingy room, covered with a Turkey carpet, and
containing a dark polished mahogany dinner-table, on very heavy
carved legs, which an old messenger was preparing at two o'clock in
the day for the use of her Majesty's Ministers. The table would have
been large enough for fourteen guests, and along the side further
from the fire, there were placed some six heavy chairs, good
comfortable chairs, stuffed at the back as well as the seat,--but on
the side nearer to the fire the chairs were placed irregularly; and
there were four armchairs,--two on one side and two on the other.
There were four windows to the room, which looked on to St. James's
Park, and the curtains of the windows were dark and heavy,--as became
the gravity of the purposes to which that chamber was appropriated.
In old days it had been the dining-room of one Prime Minister after
another. To Pitt it had been the abode of his own familiar prandial
Penates, and Lord Liverpool had been dull there among his dull
friends for long year after year. The Ministers of the present day
find it more convenient to live in private homes, and, indeed, not
unfrequently carry their Cabinets with them. But, under Mr. Mildmay's
rule, the meetings were generally held in the old room at the
official residence. Thrice did the aged messenger move each armchair,
now a little this way and now a little that, and then look at them as
though something of the tendency of the coming meeting might depend
on the comfort of its leading members. If Mr. Mildmay should find
himself to be quite comfortable, so that he could hear what was said
without a struggle to his ear, and see his colleagues' faces clearly,
and feel the fire without burning his shins, it might be possible
that he would not insist upon resigning. If this were so, how
important was the work now confided to the hands of that aged
messenger! When his anxious eyes had glanced round the room some
half a dozen times, when he had touched each curtain, laid his
hand upon every chair, and dusted certain papers which lay upon a
side-table,--and which had been lying there for two years, and at
which no one ever looked or would look,--he gently crept away and
ensconced himself in an easy chair not far from the door of the
chamber. For it might be necessary to stop the attempt of a rash
intruder on those secret counsels.
Very shortly there was heard the ring of various voices in the
passages,--the voices of men speaking pleasantly, the voices of men
with whom it seemed, from their tone, that things were doing well
in the world. And then a cluster of four or five gentlemen entered
the room. At first sight they seemed to be as ordinary gentlemen as
you shall meet anywhere about Pall Mall on an afternoon. There was
nothing about their outward appearance of the august wiggery of
statecraft, nothing of the ponderous dignity of ministerial position.
That little man in the square-cut coat,--we may almost call it a
shooting-coat,--swinging an umbrella and wearing no gloves, is no
less a person than the Lord Chancellor,--Lord Weazeling,--who made
a hundred thousand pounds as Attorney-General, and is supposed
to be the best lawyer of his age. He is fifty, but he looks to
be hardly over forty, and one might take him to be, from his
appearance,--perhaps a clerk in the War Office, well-to-do, and
popular among his brother-clerks. Immediately with him is Sir Harry
Coldfoot, also a lawyer by profession, though he has never practised.
He has been in the House for nearly thirty years, and is now at the
Home Office. He is a stout, healthy, grey-haired gentleman, who
certainly does not wear the cares of office on his face. Perhaps,
however, no minister gets more bullied than he by the press, and men
say that he will be very willing to give up to some political enemy
the control of the police, and the onerous duty of judging in all
criminal appeals. Behind these come our friend Mr. Monk, young Lord
Cantrip from the colonies next door, than whom no smarter young peer
now does honour to our hereditary legislature, and Sir Marmaduke
Morecombe, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. Why Sir
Marmaduke has always been placed in Mr. Mildmay's Cabinets nobody
ever knew. As Chancellor of the Duchy he has nothing to do,--and were
there anything, he would not do it. He rarely speaks in the House,
and then does not speak well. He is a handsome man, or would be but
for an assumption of grandeur in the carriage of his eyes, giving to
his face a character of pomposity which he himself well deserves. He
was in the Guards when young, and has been in Parliament since he
ceased to be young. It must be supposed that Mr. Mildmay has found
something in him, for he has been included in three successive
liberal Cabinets. He has probably the virtue of being true to Mr.
Mildmay, and of being duly submissive to one whom he recognises as
his superior.
Within two minutes afterwards the Duke followed, with Plantagenet
Palliser. The Duke, as all the world knows, was the Duke of St.
Bungay, the very front and head of the aristocratic old Whigs of the
country,--a man who has been thrice spoken of as Prime Minister, and
who really might have filled the office had he not known himself to
be unfit for it. The Duke has been consulted as to the making of
Cabinets for the last five-and-thirty years, and is even now not an
old man in appearance;--a fussy, popular, clever, conscientious man,
whose digestion has been too good to make politics a burden to him,
but who has thought seriously about his country, and is one who will
be sure to leave memoirs behind him. He was born in the semi-purple
of ministerial influences, and men say of him that he is honester
than his uncle, who was Canning's friend, but not so great a man as
his grandfather, with whom Fox once quarrelled, and whom Burke loved.
Plantagenet Palliser, himself the heir to a dukedom, was the young
Chancellor of the Exchequer, of whom some statesmen thought much as
the rising star of the age. If industry, rectitude of purpose, and
a certain clearness of intellect may prevail, Planty Pall, as he is
familiarly called, may become a great Minister.
Then came Viscount Thrift by himself;--the First Lord of the
Admiralty, with the whole weight of a new iron-clad fleet upon his
shoulders. He has undertaken the Herculean task of cleansing the
dockyards,--and with it the lesser work of keeping afloat a navy that
may be esteemed by his countrymen to be the best in the world. And he
thinks that he will do both, if only Mr. Mildmay will not resign;--an
industrious, honest, self-denying nobleman, who works without ceasing
from morn to night, and who hopes to rise in time to high things,--to
the translating of Homer, perhaps, and the wearing of the Garter.
Close behind him there was a ruck of Ministers, with the
much-honoured grey-haired old Premier in the midst of them. There was
Mr. Gresham, the Foreign Minister, said to be the greatest orator
in Europe, on whose shoulders it was thought that the mantle of Mr.
Mildmay would fall,--to be worn, however, quite otherwise than Mr.
Mildmay had worn it. For Mr. Gresham is a man with no feelings
for the past, void of historical association, hardly with
memories,--living altogether for the future which he is anxious to
fashion anew out of the vigour of his own brain. Whereas, with Mr.
Mildmay, even his love of reform is an inherited passion for an
old-world Liberalism. And there was with them Mr. Legge Wilson, the
brother of a peer, Secretary at War, a great scholar and a polished
gentleman, very proud of his position as a Cabinet Minister, but
conscious that he has hardly earned it by political work. And Lord
Plinlimmon is with them, the Comptroller of India,--of all working
lords the most jaunty, the most pleasant, and the most popular, very
good at taking chairs at dinners, and making becoming speeches at the
shortest notice, a man apparently very free and open in his ways of
life,--but cautious enough in truth as to every step, knowing well
how hard it is to climb and how easy to fall. Mr. Mildmay entered
the room leaning on Lord Plinlimmon's arm, and when he made his way
up among the armchairs upon the rug before the fire, the others
clustered around him with cheering looks and kindly questions. Then
came the Privy Seal, our old friend Lord Brentford, last,--and
I would say least, but that the words of no councillor could go
for less in such an assemblage than will those of Sir Marmaduke
Morecombe, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.
Mr. Mildmay was soon seated in one of the armchairs, while Lord
Plinlimmon leaned against the table close at his elbow. Mr. Gresham
stood upright at the corner of the chimney-piece furthest from Mr.
Mildmay, and Mr. Palliser at that nearest to him. The Duke took the
armchair close at Mr. Mildmay's left hand. Lord Plinlimmon was, as I
have said, leaning against the table, but the Lord Chancellor, who
was next to him, sat upon it. Viscount Thrift and Mr. Monk occupied
chairs on the further side of the table, near to Mr. Mildmay's end,
and Mr. Legge Wilson placed himself at the head of the table, thus
joining them as it were into a body. The Home Secretary stood before
the Lord Chancellor screening him from the fire, and the Chancellor
of the Duchy, after waiting for a few minutes as though in doubt,
took one of the vacant armchairs. The young lord from the Colonies
stood a little behind the shoulders of his great friend from the
Foreign Office; and the Privy Seal, after moving about for a while
uneasily, took a chair behind the Chancellor of the Duchy. One
armchair was thus left vacant, but there was no other comer.
"It is not so bad as I thought it would be," said the Duke, speaking
aloud, but nevertheless addressing himself specially to his chief.
"It was bad enough," said Mr. Mildmay, laughing.
"Bad enough indeed," said Sir Marmaduke Morecombe, without any
laughter.
"And such a good bill lost," said Lord Plinlimmon. "The worst of
these failures is, that the same identical bill can never be brought
in again."
"So that if the lost bill was best, the bill that will not be lost
can only be second best," said the Lord Chancellor.
"I certainly did think that after the debate before Easter we should
not have come to shipwreck about the ballot," said Mr. Mildmay.
"It was brewing for us all along," said Mr. Gresham, who then with a
gesture of his hand and a pressure of his lips withheld words which
he was nearly uttering, and which would not, probably, have been
complimentary to Mr. Turnbull. As it was, he turned half round and
said something to Lord Cantrip which was not audible to any one else
in the room. It was worthy of note, however, that Mr. Turnbull's name
was not once mentioned aloud at that meeting.
"I am afraid it was brewing all along," said Sir Marmaduke Morecombe
gravely.
"Well, gentlemen, we must take it as we get it," said Mr. Mildmay,
still smiling. "And now we must consider what we shall do at once."
Then he paused as though expecting that counsel would come to him
first from one colleague and then from another. But no such counsel
came, and probably Mr. Mildmay did not in the least expect that it
would come.
"We cannot stay where we are, of course," said the Duke. The Duke was
privileged to say as much as that. But though every man in the room
knew that it must be so, no one but the Duke would have said it,
before Mr. Mildmay had spoken plainly himself.
"No," said Mr. Mildmay; "I suppose that we can hardly stay where we
are. Probably none of us wish it, gentlemen." Then he looked round
upon his colleagues, and there came a sort of an assent, though there
were no spoken words. The sound from Sir Marmaduke Morecombe was
louder than that from the others;--but yet from him it was no more
than an attesting grunt. "We have two things to consider," continued
Mr. Mildmay,--and though he spoke in a very low voice, every word was
heard by all present,--"two things chiefly, that is; the work of the
country and the Queen's comfort. I propose to see her Majesty this
afternoon at five,--that is, in something less than two hours' time,
and I hope to be able to tell the House by seven what has taken place
between her Majesty and me. My friend, his Grace, will do as much in
the House of Lords. If you agree with me, gentlemen, I will explain
to the Queen that it is not for the welfare of the country that we
should retain our places, and I will place your resignations and my
own in her Majesty's hands."
"You will advise her Majesty to send for Lord de Terrier," said Mr.
Gresham.
"Certainly;--there will be no other course open to me."
"Or to her," said Mr. Gresham. To this remark from the rising
Minister of the day, no word of reply was made; but of those present
in the room three or four of the most experienced servants of the
Crown felt that Mr. Gresham had been imprudent. The Duke, who had.
ever been afraid of Mr. Gresham, told Mr. Palliser afterwards that
such an observation should not have been made; and Sir Harry Coldfoot
pondered upon it uneasily, and Sir Marmaduke Morecombe asked Mr.
Mildmay what he thought about it. "Times change so much, and with the
times the feelings of men," said Mr. Mildmay. But I doubt whether Sir
Marmaduke quite understood him.
There was silence in the room for a moment or two after Mr. Gresham
had spoken, and then Mr. Mildmay again addressed his friends. "Of
course it may be possible that my Lord de Terrier may foresee
difficulties, or may find difficulties which will oblige him, either
at once, or after an attempt has been made, to decline the task which
her Majesty will probably commit to him. All of us, no doubt, know
that the arrangement of a government is not the most easy task in
the world; and that it is not made the more easy by an absence of a
majority in the House of Commons."
"He would dissolve, I presume," said the Duke.
"I should say so," continued Mr. Mildmay. "But it may not improbably
come to pass that her Majesty will feel herself obliged to send again
for some one or two of us, that we may tender to her Majesty the
advice which we owe to her;--for me, for instance, or for my friend
the Duke. In such a matter she would be much guided probably by what
Lord de Terrier might have suggested to her. Should this be so, and
should I be consulted, my present feeling is that we should resume
our offices so that the necessary business of the session should be
completed, and that we should then dissolve Parliament, and thus
ascertain the opinion of the country. In such case, however, we
should of course meet again."
"I quite think that the course proposed by Mr. Mildmay will be the
best," said the Duke, who had no doubt already discussed the matter
with his friend the Prime Minister in private. No one else said a
word either of argument or disagreement, and the Cabinet Council was
broken up. The old messenger, who had been asleep in his chair, stood
up and bowed as the Ministers walked by him, and then went in and
rearranged the chairs.
"He has as much idea of giving up as you or I have," said Lord
Cantrip to his friend Mr. Gresham, as they walked arm-in-arm together
from the Treasury Chambers across St. James's Park towards the clubs.
"I am not sure that he is not right," said Mr. Gresham.
"Do you mean for himself or for the country?" asked Lord Cantrip.
"For his future fame. They who have abdicated and have clung to their
abdication have always lost by it. Cincinnatus was brought back
again, and Charles V. is felt to have been foolish. The peaches of
retired ministers of which we hear so often have generally been
cultivated in a constrained seclusion;--or at least the world so
believes." They were talking probably of Mr. Mildmay, as to whom some
of his colleagues had thought it probable, knowing that he would now
resign, that he would have to-day declared his intention of laying
aside for ever the cares of office.
Mr. Monk walked home alone, and as he went there was something of
a feeling of disappointment at heart, which made him ask himself
whether Mr. Turnbull might not have been right in rebuking him for
joining the Government. But this, I think, was in no way due to Mr.
Mildmay's resignation, but rather to a conviction on Mr. Monk's part
that that he had contributed but little to his country's welfare by
sitting in Mr. Mildmay's Cabinet.
CHAPTER XXX
Mr. Kennedy's Luck
After the holding of that Cabinet Council of which the author has
dared to attempt a slight sketch in the last chapter, there were
various visits made to the Queen, first by Mr. Mildmay, and then by
Lord de Terrier, afterwards by Mr. Mildmay and the Duke together, and
then again by Lord de Terrier; and there were various explanations
made to Parliament in each House, and rivals were very courteous to
each other, promising assistance;--and at the end of it the old men
held their seats. The only change made was effected by the retirement
of Sir Marmaduke Morecombe, who was raised to the peerage, and by
the selection of--Mr. Kennedy to fill his place in the Cabinet. Mr.
Kennedy during the late debate had made one of those speeches, few
and far between, by which he had created for himself a Parliamentary
reputation; but, nevertheless, all men expressed their great
surprise, and no one could quite understand why Mr. Kennedy had been
made a Cabinet Minister.
"It is impossible to say whether he is pleased or not," said Lady
Laura, speaking of him to Phineas. "I am pleased, of course."
"His ambition must be gratified," said Phineas.
"It would be, if he had any," said Lady Laura.
"I do not believe in a man lacking ambition."
"It is hard to say. There are men who by no means wear their hearts
upon their sleeves, and my husband is one of them. He told me that it
would be unbecoming in him to refuse, and that was all he said to me
about it."
The old men held their seats, but they did so as it were only upon
further trial. Mr. Mildmay took the course which he had indicated to
his colleagues at the Cabinet meeting. Before all the explanations
and journeyings were completed, April was over, and the much-needed
Whitsuntide holidays were coming on. But little of the routine work
of the session had been done; and, as Mr. Mildmay told the House
more than once, the country would suffer were the Queen to dissolve
Parliament at this period of the year. The old Ministers would go on
with the business of the country, Lord de Terrier with his followers
having declined to take affairs into their hands; and at the close of
the session, which should be made as short as possible, writs should
be issued for new elections. This was Mr. Mildmay's programme, and it
was one of which no one dared to complain very loudly.
Mr. Turnbull, indeed, did speak a word of caution. He told Mr.
Mildmay that he had lost his bill, good in other respects, because he
had refused to introduce the ballot into his measure. Let him promise
to be wiser for the future, and to obey the manifested wishes of the
country, and then all would be well with him. In answer to this,
Mr. Mildmay declared that to the best of his power of reading the
country, his countrymen had manifested no such wish; and that if they
did so, if by the fresh election it should be shown that the ballot
was in truth desired, he would at once leave the execution of their
wishes to abler and younger hands. Mr. Turnbull expressed himself
perfectly satisfied with the Minister's answers, and said that the
coming election would show whether he or Mr. Mildmay were right.
Many men, and among them some of his colleagues, thought that Mr.
Mildmay had been imprudent. "No man ought ever to pledge himself
to anything," said Sir Harry Coldfoot to the Duke;--"that is, to
anything unnecessary." The Duke, who was very true to Mr. Mildmay,
made no reply to this, but even he thought that his old friend
had been betrayed into a promise too rapidly. But the pledge was
given, and some people already began to make much of it. There
appeared leader after leader in the _People's Banner_ urging the
constituencies to take advantage of the Prime Minister's words, and
to show clearly at the hustings that they desired the ballot. "You
had better come over to us, Mr. Finn; you had indeed," said Mr.
Slide. "Now's the time to do it, and show yourself a people's friend.
You'll have to do it sooner or later,--whether or no. Come to us and
we'll be your horgan."
But in those days Phineas was something less in love with Mr. Quintus
Slide than he had been at the time of the great debate, for he was
becoming more and more closely connected with people who in their
ways of living and modes of expression were very unlike Mr. Slide.
This advice was given to him about the end of May, and at that
time Lord Chiltern was living with him in the lodgings in Great
Marlborough Street. Miss Pouncefoot had temporarily vacated her
rooms on the first floor, and the Lord with the broken bones had
condescended to occupy them. "I don't know that I like having a
Lord," Bunce had said to his wife. "It'll soon come to you not liking
anybody decent anywhere," Mrs. Bunce had replied; "but I shan't ask
any questions about it. When you're wasting so much time and money
at your dirty law proceedings, it's well that somebody should earn
something at home."
There had been many discussions about the bringing of Lord Chiltern
up to London, in all of which Phineas had been concerned. Lord
Brentford had thought that his son had better remain down at the
Willingford Bull; and although he said that the rooms were at his
son's disposal should Lord Chiltern choose to come to London, still
he said it in such a way that Phineas, who went down to Willingford,
could not tell his friend that he would be made welcome in Portman
Square. "I think I shall leave those diggings altogether," Lord
Chiltern said to him. "My father annoys me by everything he says and
does, and I annoy him by saying and doing nothing." Then there came
an invitation to him from Lady Laura and Mr. Kennedy. Would he come
to Grosvenor Place? Lady Laura pressed this very much, though in
truth Mr. Kennedy had hardly done more than give a cold assent. But
Lord Chiltern would not hear of it. "There is some reason for my
going to my father's house," said he, "though he and I are not the
best friends in the world; but there can be no reason for my going
to the house of a man I dislike so much as I do Robert Kennedy." The
matter was settled in the manner told above. Miss Pouncefoot's rooms
were prepared for him at Mr. Bunce's house, and Phineas Finn went
down to Willingford and brought him up. "I've sold Bonebreaker," he
said,--"to a young fellow whose neck will certainly be the sacrifice
if he attempts to ride him. I'd have given him to you, Phineas, only
you wouldn't have known what to do with him."
Lord Chiltern when he came up to London was still in bandages,
though, as the surgeon said, his bones seemed to have been made to be
broken and set again; and his bandages of course were a sufficient
excuse for his visiting the house neither of his father nor his
brother-in-law. But Lady Laura went to him frequently, and thus
became acquainted with our hero's home and with Mrs. Bunce. And there
were messages taken from Violet to the man in bandages, some of which
lost nothing in the carrying. Once Lady Laura tried to make Violet
think that it would be right, or rather not wrong, that they two
should go together to Lord Chiltern's rooms.
"And would you have me tell my aunt, or would you have me not tell
her?" Violet asked.
"I would have you do just as you pleased," Lady Laura answered.
"So I shall," Violet replied, "but I will do nothing that I should be
ashamed to tell any one. Your brother professes to be in love with
me."
"He is in love with you," said Lady Laura. "Even you do not pretend
to doubt his faith."
"Very well. In those circumstances a girl should not go to a man's
rooms unless she means to consider herself as engaged to him, even
with his sister;--not though he had broken every bone in his skin. I
know what I may do, Laura, and I know what I mayn't; and I won't be
led either by you or by my aunt."
"May I give him your love?"
"No;--because you'll give it in a wrong spirit. He knows well enough
that I wish him well;--but you may tell him that from me, if you
please. He has from me all those wishes which one friend owes to
another."
But there were other messages sent from Violet through Phineas Finn
which she worded with more show of affection,--perhaps as much for
the discomfort of Phineas as for the consolation of Lord Chiltern.
"Tell him to take care of himself," said Violet, "and bid him not to
have any more of those wild brutes that are not fit for any Christian
to ride. Tell him that I say so. It's a great thing to be brave; but
what's the use of being foolhardy?"
The session was to be closed at the end of June, to the great dismay
of London tradesmen and of young ladies who had not been entirely
successful in the early season. But before the old Parliament was
closed, and the writs for the new election were despatched, there
occurred an incident which was of very much importance to Phineas
Finn. Near the end of June, when the remaining days of the session
were numbered by three or four, he had been dining at Lord
Brentford's house in Portman Square in company with Mr. Kennedy. But
Lady Laura had not been there. At this time he saw Lord Brentford not
unfrequently, and there was always a word said about Lord Chiltern.
The father would ask how the son occupied himself, and Phineas would
hope,--though hitherto he had hoped in vain,--that he would induce
the Earl to come and see Lord Chiltern. Lord Brentford could never be
brought to that; but it was sufficiently evident that he would have
done so, had he not been afraid to descend so far from the altitude
of his paternal wrath. On this evening, at about eleven, Mr. Kennedy
and Phineas left the house together, and walked from the Square
through Orchard Street into Oxford Street. Here their ways parted,
but Phineas crossed the road with Mr. Kennedy, as he was making some
reply to a second invitation to Loughlinter. Phineas, considering
what had been said before on the subject, thought that the invitation
came late, and that it was not warmly worded. He had, therefore,
declined it, and was in the act of declining it, when he crossed the
road with Mr. Kennedy. In walking down Orchard Street from the Square
he had seen two men standing in the shadow a few yards up a mews or
small alley that was there, but had thought nothing of them. It was
just that period of the year when there is hardly any of the darkness
of night; but at this moment there were symptoms of coming rain, and
heavy drops began to fall; and there were big clouds coming and going
before the young moon. Mr. Kennedy had said that he would get a cab,
but he had seen none as he crossed Oxford Street, and had put up his
umbrella as he made his way towards Park Street. Phineas as he left
him distinctly perceived the same two figures on the other side of
Oxford Street, and then turning into the shadow of a butcher's porch,
he saw them cross the street in the wake of Mr. Kennedy. It was now
raining in earnest, and the few passengers who were out were scudding
away quickly, this way and that.
It hardly occurred to Phineas to think that any danger was imminent
to Mr. Kennedy from the men, but it did occur to him that he might as
well take some notice of the matter. Phineas knew that Mr. Kennedy
would make his way down Park Street, that being his usual route from
Portman Square towards his own home, and knew also that he himself
could again come across Mr. Kennedy's track by going down North
Audley Street to the corner of Grosvenor Square, and thence by Brook
Street into Park Street. Without much thought, therefore, he went
out of his own course down to the corner of the Square, hurrying his
steps till he was running, and then ran along Brook Street, thinking
as he went of some special word that he might say to Mr. Kennedy as
an excuse, should he again come across his late companion. He reached
the corner of Park Street before that gentleman could have been there
unless he also had run; but just in time to see him as he was coming
on,--and also to see in the dark glimmering of the slight uncertain
moonlight that the two men were behind him. He retreated a step
backwards in the corner, resolving that when Mr. Kennedy came up,
they two would go on together; for now it was clear that Mr. Kennedy
was followed. But Mr. Kennedy did not reach the corner. When he was
within two doors of it, one of the men had followed him up quickly,
and had thrown something round his throat from behind him. Phineas
understood well now that his friend was in the act of being
garrotted, and that his instant assistance was needed. He rushed
forward, and as the second ruffian had been close upon the footsteps
of the first, there was almost instantaneously a concourse of the
four men. But there was no fight. The man who had already nearly
succeeded in putting Mr. Kennedy on to his back, made no attempt to
seize his prey when he found that so unwelcome an addition had joined
the party, but instantly turned to fly. His companion was turning
also, but Phineas was too quick for him, and having seized on to his
collar, held to him with all his power. "Dash it all," said the man,
"didn't yer see as how I was a-hurrying up to help the gen'leman
myself?" Phineas, however, hadn't seen this, and held on gallantly,
and in a couple of minutes the first ruffian was back again upon the
spot in the custody of a policeman. "You've done it uncommon neat,
sir," said the policeman, complimenting Phineas upon his performance.
"If the gen'leman ain't none the worst for it, it'll have been a very
pretty evening's amusement." Mr. Kennedy was now leaning against the
railings, and hitherto had been unable to declare whether he was
really injured or not, and it was not till a second policeman came up
that the hero of the night was at liberty to attend closely to his
friend.
Mr. Kennedy, when he was able to speak, declared that for a minute
or two he had thought that his neck had been broken; and he was not
quite convinced till he found himself in his own house, that nothing
more serious had really happened to him than certain bruises round
his throat. The policeman was for a while anxious that at any
rate Phineas should go with him to the police-office; but at last
consented to take the addresses of the two gentlemen. When he
found that Mr. Kennedy was a member of Parliament, and that he was
designated as Right Honourable, his respect for the garrotter became
more great, and he began to feel that the night was indeed a night
of great importance. He expressed unbounded admiration at Mr. Finn's
success in his own line, and made repeated promises that the men
should be forthcoming on the morrow. Could a cab be got? Of course a
cab could be got. A cab was got, and within a quarter of an hour of
the making of the attack, the two members of Parliament were on their
way to Grosvenor Place.
There was hardly a word spoken in the cab, for Mr. Kennedy was in
pain. When, however, they reached the door in Grosvenor Place,
Phineas wanted to go, and leave his friend with the servants, but
this the Cabinet Minister would not allow. "Of course you must see
my wife," he said. So they went up-stairs into the drawing-room,
and then upon the stairs, by the lights of the house, Phineas could
perceive that his companion's face was bruised and black with dirt,
and that his cravat was gone.
"I have been garrotted," said the Cabinet Minister to his wife.
"What?"
"Simply that;--or should have been, if he had not been there. How he
came there, God only knows."
The wife's anxiety, and then her gratitude, need hardly be
described,--nor the astonishment of the husband, which by no means
decreased on reflection, at the opportune re-appearance in the nick
of time of the man whom three minutes before the attack he had left
in the act of going in the opposite direction.
"I had seen the men, and thought it best to run round by the corner
of Grosvenor Square," said Phineas.
"May God bless you," said Lady Laura.
"Amen," said the Cabinet Minister.
"I think he was born to be my friend," said Lady Laura.
The Cabinet Minister said nothing more that night. He was never given
to much talking, and the little accident which had just occurred to
him did not tend to make words easy to him. But he pressed our hero's
hand, and Lady Laura said that of course Phineas would come to them
on the morrow. Phineas remarked that his first business must be to
go to the police-office, but he promised that he would come down to
Grosvenor Place immediately afterwards. Then Lady Laura also pressed
his hand, and looked--; she looked, I think, as though she thought
that Phineas would only have done right had he repeated the offence
which he had committed under the waterfall of Loughlinter.
"Garrotted!" said Lord Chiltern, when Phineas told him the story
before they went to bed that night. He had been smoking, sipping
brandy-and-water, and waiting for Finn's return. "Robert Kennedy
garrotted!"
"The fellow was in the act of doing it."
"And you stopped him?"
"Yes;--I got there just in time. Wasn't it lucky?"
"You ought to be garrotted yourself. I should have lent the man a
hand had I been there."
"How can you say anything so horrible? But you are drinking too much,
old fellow, and I shall lock the bottle up."
"If there were no one in London drank more than I do, the wine
merchants would have a bad time of it. And so the new Cabinet
Minister has been garrotted in the street. Of course I'm sorry for
poor Laura's sake."
"Luckily he's not much the worse for it;--only a little bruised."
"I wonder whether it's on the cards he should be improved by
it;--worse, except in the way of being strangled, he could not be.
However, as he's my brother-in-law, I'm obliged to you for rescuing
him. Come, I'll go to bed. I must say, if he was to be garrotted I
should like to have been there to see it." That was the manner in
which Lord Chiltern received the tidings of the terrible accident
which had occurred to his near relative.
CHAPTER XXXI
Finn for Loughton
By three o'clock in the day after the little accident which was told
in the last chapter, all the world knew that Mr. Kennedy, the new
Cabinet Minister, had been garrotted, or half garrotted, and that
that child of fortune, Phineas Finn, had dropped upon the scene out
of heaven at the exact moment of time, had taken the two garrotters
prisoners, and saved the Cabinet Minister's neck and valuables,--if
not his life. "Bedad," said Laurence Fitzgibbon, when he came to hear
this, "that fellow'll marry an heiress, and be Secretary for Oireland
yet." A good deal was said about it to Phineas at the clubs, but a
word or two that was said to him by Violet Effingham was worth all
the rest. "Why, what a Paladin you are! But you succour men in
distress instead of maidens." "That's my bad luck," said Phineas.
"The other will come no doubt in time," Violet replied; "and then
you'll get your reward." He knew that such words from a girl mean
nothing,--especially from such a girl as Violet Effingham; but
nevertheless they were very pleasant to him.
"Of course you will come to us at Loughlinter when Parliament is up?"
Lady Laura said the same day.
"I don't know really. You see I must go over to Ireland about my
re-election."
"What has that to do with it? You are only making out excuses. We
go down on the first of July, and the English elections won't begin
till the middle of the month. It will be August before the men of
Loughshane are ready for you."
"To tell you the truth, Lady Laura," said Phineas, "I doubt whether
the men of Loughshane,--or rather the man of Loughshane, will have
anything more to say to me."
"What man do you mean?"
"Lord Tulla. He was in a passion with his brother before, and I got
the advantage of it. Since that he has paid his brother's debts for
the fifteenth time, and of course is ready to fight any battle for
the forgiven prodigal. Things are not as they were, and my father
tells me that he thinks I shall be beaten."
"That is bad news."
"It is what I have a right to expect."
Every word of information that had come to Phineas about Loughshane
since Mr. Mildmay had decided upon a dissolution, had gone towards
making him feel at first that there was a great doubt as to his
re-election, and at last that there was almost a certainty against
him. And as these tidings reached him they made him very unhappy.
Since he had been in Parliament he had very frequently regretted
that he had left the shades of the Inns of Court for the glare of
Westminster; and he had more than once made up his mind that he would
desert the glare and return to the shade. But now, when the moment
came in which such desertion seemed to be compulsory on him, when
there would be no longer a choice, the seat in Parliament was dearer
to him than ever. If he had gone of his own free will,--so he told
himself,--there would have been something of nobility in such going.
Mr. Low would have respected him, and even Mrs. Low might have taken
him back to the friendship of her severe bosom. But he would go back
now as a cur with his tail between his legs,--kicked out, as it were,
from Parliament. Returning to Lincoln's Inn soiled with failure,
having accomplished nothing, having broken down on the only occasion
on which he had dared to show himself on his legs, not having opened
a single useful book during the two years in which he had sat in
Parliament, burdened with Laurence Fitzgibbon's debt, and not quite
free from debt of his own, how could he start himself in any way by
which he might even hope to win success? He must, he told himself,
give up all thought of practising in London and betake himself to
Dublin. He could not dare to face his friends in London as a young
briefless barrister.
On this evening, the evening subsequent to that on which Mr. Kennedy
had been attacked, the House was sitting in Committee of Ways and
Means, and there came on a discussion as to a certain vote for the
army. It had been known that there would be such discussion; and Mr.
Monk having heard from Phineas a word or two now and again about the
potted peas, had recommended him to be ready with a few remarks if he
wished to support the Government in the matter of that vote. Phineas
did so wish, having learned quite enough in the Committee Room
up-stairs to make him believe that a large importation of the
potted peas from Holstein would not be for the advantage of the
army or navy,--or for that of the country at large. Mr. Monk had
made his suggestion without the slightest allusion to the former
failure,--just as though Phineas were a practised speaker accustomed
to be on his legs three or four times a week. "If I find a chance, I
will," said Phineas, taking the advice just as it was given.
Soon after prayers, a word was said in the House as to the
ill-fortune which had befallen the new Cabinet Minister. Mr. Daubeny
had asked Mr. Mildmay whether violent hands had not been laid in the
dead of night on the sacred throat,--the throat that should have been
sacred,--of the new Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster; and had
expressed regret that the Ministry,--which was, he feared, in other
respects somewhat infirm,--should now have been further weakened by
this injury to that new bulwark with which it had endeavoured to
support itself. The Prime Minister, answering his old rival in the
same strain, said that the calamity might have been very severe,
both to the country and to the Cabinet; but that fortunately for the
community at large, a gallant young member of that House,--and he was
proud to say a supporter of the Government,--had appeared upon the
spot at the nick of time;--"As a god out of a machine," said Mr.
Daubeny, interrupting him;--"By no means as a god out of a machine,"
continued Mr. Mildmay, "but as a real help in a very real trouble,
and succeeded not only in saving my right honourable friend, the
Chancellor of the Duchy, but in arresting the two malefactors who
attempted to rob him in the street." Then there was a cry of "name;"
and Mr. Mildmay of course named the member for Loughshane. It so
happened that Phineas was not in the House, but he heard it all when
he came down to attend the Committee of Ways and Means.
Then came on the discussion about provisions in the army, the subject
being mooted by one of Mr. Turnbull's close allies. The gentleman
on the other side of the House who had moved for the Potted Peas
Committee, was silent on the occasion, having felt that the result
of that committee had not been exactly what he had expected. The
evidence respecting such of the Holstein potted peas as had been used
in this country was not very favourable to them. But, nevertheless,
the rebound from that committee,--the very fact that such a committee
had been made to sit,--gave ground for a hostile attack. To attack
is so easy, when a complete refutation barely suffices to save the
Minister attacked,--does not suffice to save him from future dim
memories of something having been wrong,--and brings down no disgrace
whatsoever on the promoter of the false charge. The promoter of the
false charge simply expresses his gratification at finding that he
had been misled by erroneous information. It is not customary for him
to express gratification at the fact, that out of all the mud which
he has thrown, some will probably stick! Phineas, when the time came,
did get on his legs, and spoke perhaps two or three dozen words. The
doing so seemed to come to him quite naturally. He had thought very
little about it beforehand,--having resolved not to think of it. And
indeed the occasion was one of no great importance. The Speaker was
not in the chair, and the House was thin, and he intended to make no
speech,--merely to say something which he had to say. Till he had
finished he hardly remembered that he was doing that, in attempting
to do which he had before failed so egregiously. It was not till he
sat down that he began to ask himself whether the scene was swimming
before his eyes as it had done on former occasions; as it had done
even when he had so much as thought of making a speech. Now he was
astonished at the easiness of the thing, and as he left the House
told himself that he had overcome the difficulty just when the
victory could be of no avail to him. Had he been more eager, more
constant in his purpose, he might at any rate have shown the world
that he was fit for the place which he had presumed to take before
he was cast out of it.
On the next morning he received a letter from his father. Dr. Finn
had seen Lord Tulla, having been sent for to relieve his lordship in
a fit of the gout, and had been informed by the Earl that he meant to
fight the borough to the last man;--had he said to the last shilling
he would have spoken with perhaps more accuracy. "You see, doctor,
your son has had it for two years, as you may say for nothing, and I
think he ought to give way. He can't expect that he's to go on there
as though it were his own." And then his lordship, upon whom this
touch of the gout had come somewhat sharply, expressed himself with
considerable animation. The old doctor behaved with much spirit. "I
told the Earl," he said, "that I could not undertake to say what you
might do; but that as you had come forward at first with my sanction,
I could not withdraw it now. He asked me if I should support you with
money; I said that I should to a moderate extent. 'By G----,' said
the Earl, 'a moderate extent will go a very little way, I can tell
you.' Since that he has had Duggin with him; so, I suppose, I shall
not see him any more. You can do as you please now; but, from what I
hear, I fear you will have no chance." Then with much bitterness of
spirit Phineas resolved that he would not interfere with Lord Tulla
at Loughshane. He would go at once to the Reform Club and explain his
reasons to Barrington Erle and others there who would be interested.
But he first went to Grosvenor Place. Here he was shown up into Mr.
Kennedy's room. Mr. Kennedy was up and seated in an arm-chair by an
open window looking over into the Queen's garden; but he was in his
dressing-gown, and was to be regarded as an invalid. And indeed as he
could not turn his neck, or thought that he could not do so, he was
not very fit to go out about his work. Let us hope that the affairs
of the Duchy of Lancaster did not suffer materially by his absence.
We may take it for granted that with a man so sedulous as to all his
duties there was no arrear of work when the accident took place. He
put out his hand to Phineas, and said some word in a whisper,--some
word or two among which Phineas caught the sound of "potted
peas,"--and then continued to look out of the window. There are men
who are utterly prostrated by any bodily ailment, and it seemed that
Mr. Kennedy was one of them. Phineas, who was full of his own bad
news, had intended to tell his sad story at once. But he perceived
that the neck of the Chancellor of the Duchy was too stiff to allow
of his taking any interest in external matters, and so he refrained.
"What does the doctor say about it?" said Phineas, perceiving that
just for the present there could be only one possible subject for
remark. Mr. Kennedy was beginning to describe in a long whisper what
the doctor did think about it, when Lady Laura came into the room.
Of course they began at first to talk about Mr. Kennedy. It would not
have been kind to him not to have done so. And Lady Laura made much
of the injury, as it behoves a wife to do in such circumstances for
the sake both of the sufferer and of the hero. She declared her
conviction that had Phineas been a moment later her husband's neck
would have been irredeemably broken.
"I don't think they ever do kill the people," said Phineas. "At any
rate they don't mean to do so."
"I thought they did," said Lady Laura.
"I fancy not," said Phineas, eager in the cause of truth.
"I think this man was very clumsy," whispered Mr. Kennedy.
"Perhaps he was a beginner," said Phineas, "and that may make a
difference. If so, I'm afraid we have interfered with his
education."
Then, by degrees, the conversation got away to other things, and Lady
Laura asked him after Loughshane. "I've made up my mind to give it
up," said he, smiling as he spoke.
"I was afraid there was but a bad chance," said Lady Laura, smiling
also.
"My father has behaved so well!" said Phineas. "He has written to say
he'll find the money, if I determine to contest the borough. I mean
to write to him by to-night's post to decline the offer. I have no
right to spend the money, and I shouldn't succeed if I did spend it.
Of course it makes me a little down in the mouth." And then he smiled
again.
"I've got a plan of my own," said Lady Laura.
"What plan?"
"Or rather it isn't mine, but papa's. Old Mr. Standish is going to
give up Loughton, and papa wants you to come and try your luck
there."
"Lady Laura!"
"It isn't quite a certainty, you know, but I suppose it's as near a
certainty as anything left." And this came from a strong Radical
Reformer!
"Lady Laura, I couldn't accept such a favour from your father." Then
Mr. Kennedy nodded his head very slightly and whispered, "Yes, yes."
"I couldn't think of it," said Phineas Finn. "I have no right to such
a favour."
"That is a matter entirely for papa's consideration," said Lady
Laura, with an affectation of solemnity in her voice. "I think it has
always been felt that any politician may accept such an offer as that
when it is made to him, but that no politician should ask for it. My
father feels that he has to do the best he can with his influence in
the borough, and therefore he comes to you."
"It isn't that," said Phineas, somewhat rudely.
"Of course private feelings have their weight," said Lady Laura. "It
is not probable that papa would have gone to a perfect stranger. And
perhaps, Mr. Finn, I may own that Mr. Kennedy and I would both be
very sorry that you should not be in the House, and that that feeling
on our part has had some weight with my father."
"Of course you'll stand?" whispered Mr. Kennedy, still looking
straight out of the window, as though the slightest attempt to turn
his neck would be fraught with danger to himself and the Duchy.
"Papa has desired me to ask you to call upon him," said Lady Laura.
"I don't suppose there is very much to be said, as each of you know
so well the other's way of thinking. But you had better see him
to-day or to-morrow."
Of course Phineas was persuaded before he left Mr. Kennedy's room.
Indeed, when he came to think of it, there appeared to him to be no
valid reason why he should not sit for Loughton. The favour was of
a kind that had prevailed from time out of mind in England, between
the most respectable of the great land magnates, and young rising
liberal politicians. Burke, Fox, and Canning had all been placed in
Parliament by similar influence. Of course he, Phineas Finn, desired
earnestly,--longed in his very heart of hearts,--to extinguish all
such Parliamentary influence, to root out for ever the last vestige
of close borough nominations; but while the thing remained it was
better that the thing should contribute to the liberal than to the
conservative strength of the House,--and if to the liberal, how was
this to be achieved but by the acceptance of such influence by some
liberal candidate? And if it were right that it should be accepted
by any liberal candidate,--then, why not by him? The logic of this
argument seemed to him to be perfect. He felt something like a
sting of reproach as he told himself that in truth this great offer
was made to him, not on account of the excellence of his politics,
but because he had been instrumental in saving Lord Brentford's
son-in-law from the violence of garrotters. But he crushed these
qualms of conscience as being over-scrupulous, and, as he told
himself, not practical. You must take the world as you find it,
with a struggle to be something more honest than those around you.
Phineas, as he preached to himself this sermon, declared to himself
that they who attempted more than this flew too high in the clouds
to be of service to men and women upon earth.
As he did not see Lord Brentford that day he postponed writing to his
father for twenty-four hours. On the following morning he found the
Earl at home in Portman Square, having first discussed the matter
fully with Lord Chiltern. "Do not scruple about me," said Lord
Chiltern; "you are quite welcome to the borough for me."
"But if I did not stand, would you do so? There are so many reasons
which ought to induce you to accept a seat in Parliament!"
"Whether that be true or not, Phineas, I shall not accept my father's
interest at Loughton, unless it be offered to me in a way in which
it never will be offered. You know me well enough to be sure that I
shall not change my mind. Nor will he. And, therefore, you may go
down to Loughton with a pure conscience as far as I am concerned."
Phineas had his interview with the Earl, and in ten minutes
everything was settled. On his way to Portman Square there had come
across his mind the idea of a grand effort of friendship. What if he
could persuade the father so to conduct himself towards his son, that
the son should consent to be a member for the borough? And he did
say a word or two to this effect, setting forth that Lord Chiltern
would condescend to become a legislator, if only his father would
condescend to acknowledge his son's fitness for such work without
any comments on the son's past life. But the Earl simply waived the
subject away with his hand. He could be as obstinate as his son. Lady
Laura had been the Mercury between them on this subject, and Lady
Laura had failed. He would not now consent to employ another Mercury.
Very little,--hardly a word indeed,--was said between the Earl and
Phineas about politics. Phineas was to be the Saulsby candidate at
Loughton for the next election, and was to come to Saulsby with the
Kennedys from Loughlinter,--either with the Kennedys or somewhat in
advance of them. "I do not say that there will be no opposition,"
said the Earl, "but I expect none." He was very courteous,--nay,
he was kind, feeling doubtless that his family owed a great debt
of gratitude to the young man with whom he was conversing; but,
nevertheless, there was not absent on his part a touch of that high
condescension which, perhaps, might be thought to become the Earl,
the Cabinet Minister, and the great borough patron. Phineas, who
was sensitive, felt this and winced. He had never quite liked Lord
Brentford, and could not bring himself to do so now in spite of the
kindness which the Earl was showing him.
But he was very happy when he sat down to write to his father
from the club. His father had told him that the money should be
forthcoming for the election at Loughshane, if he resolved to stand,
but that the chance of success would be very slight,--indeed that, in
his opinion, there would be no chance of success. Nevertheless, his
father had evidently believed, when writing, that Phineas would not
abandon his seat without a useless and expensive contest. He now
thanked his father with many expressions of gratitude,--declared his
conviction that his father was right about Lord Tulla, and then,
in the most modest language that he could use, went on to say that
he had found another borough open to him in England. He was going
to stand for Loughton, with the assistance of Lord Brentford, and
thought that the election would probably not cost him above a couple
of hundred pounds at the outside. Then he wrote a very pretty note
to Lord Tulla, thanking him for his former kindness, and telling
the Irish Earl that it was not his intention to interfere with the
borough of Loughshane at the next election.
A few days after this Phineas was very much surprised at a visit
that was made to him at his lodgings. Mr. Clarkson, after that
scene in the lobby of the House, called again in Great Marlborough
Street,--and was admitted. "You had better let him sit in your
armchair for half an hour or so," Fitzgibbon had said; and Phineas
almost believed that it would be better. The man was a terrible
nuisance to him, and he was beginning to think that he had better
undertake to pay the debt by degrees. It was, he knew, quite on the
cards that Mr. Clarkson should have him arrested while at Saulsby.
Since that scene in the lobby Mr. Clarkson had been with him twice,
and there had been a preliminary conversation as to real payment.
Mr. Clarkson wanted a hundred pounds down, and another bill for two
hundred and twenty at three months' date. "Think of my time and
trouble in coming here," Mr. Clarkson had urged when Phineas had
objected to these terms. "Think of my time and trouble, and do be
punctual, Mr. Finn." Phineas had offered him ten pounds a quarter,
the payments to be marked on the back of the bill, a tender which Mr.
Clarkson had not seemed to regard as strong evidence of punctuality.
He had not been angry, but had simply expressed his intention of
calling again,--giving Phineas to understand that business would
probably take him to the west of Ireland in the autumn. If only
business might not take him down either to Loughlinter or to Saulsby!
But the strange visitor who came to Phineas in the midst of these
troubles put an end to them all.
The strange visitor was Miss Aspasia Fitzgibbon. "You'll be very much
surprised at my coming to your chambers, no doubt," she said, as she
sat down in the chair which Phineas placed for her. Phineas could
only say that he was very proud to be so highly honoured, and that he
hoped she was well. "Pretty well, I thank you. I have just come about
a little business, Mr. Finn, and I hope you'll excuse me."
"I'm quite sure that there is no need for excuses," said Phineas.
"Laurence, when he hears about it, will say that I've been an
impertinent old fool; but I never care what Laurence says, either
this way or that. I've been to that Mr. Clarkson, Mr. Finn, and I've
paid him the money."
"No!" said Phineas.
"But I have, Mr. Finn. I happened to hear what occurred that night at
the door of the House of Commons."
"Who told you, Miss Fitzgibbon?"
"Never mind who told me. I heard it. I knew before that you had been
foolish enough to help Laurence about money, and so I put two and two
together. It isn't the first time I have had to do with Mr. Clarkson.
So I sent to him, and I've bought the bill. There it is." And Miss
Fitzgibbon produced the document which bore the name of Phineas Finn
across the front of it.
"And did you pay him two hundred and fifty pounds for it?"
"Not quite. I had a very hard tussle, and got it at last for two
hundred and twenty pounds."
"And did you do it yourself?"
"All myself. If I had employed a lawyer I should have had to pay
two hundred and forty pounds and five pounds for costs. And now,
Mr. Finn, I hope you won't have any more money engagements with my
brother Laurence." Phineas said that he thought he might promise that
he would have no more. "Because, if you do, I shan't interfere. If
Laurence began to find that he could get money out of me in that way,
there would be no end to it. Mr. Clarkson would very soon be spending
his spare time in my drawing-room. Good-bye, Mr. Finn. If Laurence
says anything, just tell him that he'd better come to me." Then
Phineas was left looking at the bill. It was certainly a great relief
to him,--that he should be thus secured from the domiciliary visits
of Mr. Clarkson; a great relief to him to be assured that Mr.
Clarkson would not find him out down at Loughton; but nevertheless,
he had to suffer a pang of shame as he felt that Miss Fitzgibbon had
become acquainted with his poverty and had found herself obliged to
satisfy his pecuniary liabilities.
CHAPTER XXXII
Lady Laura Kennedy's Headache
Phineas went down to Loughlinter early in July, taking Loughton in
his way. He stayed there one night at the inn, and was introduced to
sundry influential inhabitants of the borough by Mr. Grating, the
ironmonger, who was known by those who knew Loughton to be a very
strong supporter of the Earl's interest. Mr. Grating and about half a
dozen others of the tradesmen of the town came to the inn, and met
Phineas in the parlour. He told them he was a good sound Liberal and
a supporter of Mr. Mildmay's Government, of which their neighbour the
Earl was so conspicuous an ornament. This was almost all that was
said about the Earl out loud; but each individual man of Loughton
then present took an opportunity during the meeting of whispering
into Mr. Finn's ear a word or two to show that he also was admitted
to the secret councils of the borough,--that he too could see the
inside of the arrangement. "Of course we must support the Earl," one
said. "Never mind what you hear about a Tory candidate, Mr. Finn,"
whispered a second; "the Earl can do what he pleases here." And it
seemed to Phineas that it was thought by them all to be rather a fine
thing to be thus held in the hand by an English nobleman. Phineas
could not but reflect much upon this as he lay in his bed at the
Loughton inn. The great political question on which the political
world was engrossed up in London was the enfranchisement of
Englishmen,--of Englishmen down to the rank of artisans and
labourers;--and yet when he found himself in contact with individual
Englishmen, with men even very much above the artisan and the
labourer, he found that they rather liked being bound hand and foot,
and being kept as tools in the political pocket of a rich man.
Every one of those Loughton tradesmen was proud of his own personal
subjection to the Earl!
From Loughton he went to Loughlinter, having promised to be back in
the borough for the election. Mr. Grating would propose him, and he
was to be seconded by Mr. Shortribs, the butcher and grazier. Mention
had been made of a Conservative candidate, and Mr. Shortribs had
seemed to think that a good stand-up fight upon English principles,
with a clear understanding, of course, that victory should prevail
on the liberal side, would be a good thing for the borough. But the
Earl's man of business saw Phineas on the morning of his departure,
and told him not to regard Mr. Shortribs. "They'd all like it," said
the man of business; "and I daresay they'll have enough of it when
this Reform Bill is passed; but at present no one will be fool enough
to come and spend his money here. We have them all in hand too well
for that, Mr. Finn!"
He found the great house at Loughlinter nearly empty. Mr. Kennedy's
mother was there, and Lord Brentford was there, and Lord Brentford's
private secretary, and Mr. Kennedy's private secretary. At present
that was the entire party. Lady Baldock was expected there, with
her daughter and Violet Effingham; but, as well as Phineas could
learn, they would not be at Loughlinter until after he had left it.
There had come up lately a rumour that there would be an autumn
session,--that the Houses would sit through October and a part of
November, in order that Mr. Mildmay might try the feeling of the new
Parliament. If this were to be so, Phineas had resolved that, in the
event of his election at Loughton, he would not return to Ireland
till after this autumn session should be over. He gave an account to
the Earl, in the presence of the Earl's son-in-law, of what had taken
place at Loughton, and the Earl expressed himself as satisfied. It
was manifestly a great satisfaction to Lord Brentford that he should
still have a borough in his pocket, and the more so because there
were so very few noblemen left who had such property belonging to
them. He was very careful in his speech, never saying in so many
words that the privilege of returning a member was his own; but his
meaning was not the less clear.
Those were dreary days at Loughlinter. There was fishing,--if Phineas
chose to fish; and he was told that he could shoot a deer if he was
minded to go out alone. But it seemed as though it were the intention
of the host that his guests should spend their time profitably. Mr.
Kennedy himself was shut up with books and papers all the morning,
and always took up a book after dinner. The Earl also would read a
little,--and then would sleep a good deal. Old Mrs. Kennedy slept
also, and Lady Laura looked as though she would like to sleep if
it were not that her husband's eye was upon her. As it was, she
administered tea, Mr. Kennedy not liking the practice of having it
handed round by a servant when none were there but members of the
family circle, and she read novels. Phineas got hold of a stiff bit
of reading for himself, and tried to utilise his time. He took Alison
in hand, and worked his way gallantly through a couple of volumes.
But even he, more than once or twice, found himself on the very verge
of slumber. Then he would wake up and try to think about things. Why
was he, Phineas Finn, an Irishman from Killaloe, living in that great
house of Loughlinter as though he were one of the family, striving to
kill the hours, and feeling that he was in some way subject to the
dominion of his host? Would it not be better for him to get up and go
away? In his heart of hearts he did not like Mr. Kennedy, though he
believed him to be a good man. And of what service to him was it to
like Lady Laura, now that Lady Laura was a possession in the hands of
Mr. Kennedy? Then he would tell himself that he owed his position in
the world entirely to Lady Laura, and that he was ungrateful to feel
himself ever dull in her society. And, moreover, there was something
to be done in the world beyond making love and being merry. Mr.
Kennedy could occupy himself with a blue book for hours together
without wincing. So Phineas went to work again with his Alison, and
read away till he nodded.
In those days he often wandered up and down the Linter and across the
moor to the Linn, and so down to the lake. He would take a book with
him, and would seat himself down on spots which he loved, and would
pretend to read;--but I do not think that he got much advantage
from his book. He was thinking of his life, and trying to calculate
whether the wonderful success which he had achieved would ever be of
permanent value to him. Would he be nearer to earning his bread when
he should be member for Loughton than he had been when he was member
for Loughshane? Or was there before him any slightest probability
that he would ever earn his bread? And then he thought of Violet
Effingham, and was angry with himself for remembering at that moment
that Violet Effingham was the mistress of a large fortune.
Once before when he was sitting beside the Linter he had made up his
mind to declare his passion to Lady Laura;--and he had done so on the
very spot. Now, within a twelvemonth of that time, he made up his
mind on the same spot to declare his passion to Miss Effingham, and
he thought his best mode of carrying his suit would be to secure the
assistance of Lady Laura. Lady Laura, no doubt, had been very anxious
that her brother should marry Violet; but Lord Chiltern, as Phineas
knew, had asked for Violet's hand twice in vain; and, moreover,
Chiltern himself had declared to Phineas that he would never ask
for it again. Lady Laura, who was always reasonable, would surely
perceive that there was no hope of success for her brother. That
Chiltern would quarrel with him,--would quarrel with him to the
knife,--he did not doubt; but he felt that no fear of such a quarrel
as that should deter him. He loved Violet Effingham, and he must
indeed be pusillanimous if, loving her as he did, he was deterred
from expressing his love from any fear of a suitor whom she did not
favour. He would not willingly be untrue to his friendship for Lady
Laura's brother. Had there been a chance for Lord Chiltern he would
have abstained from putting himself forward. But what was the use
of his abstaining, when by doing so he could in no wise benefit
his friend,--when the result of his doing so would be that some
interloper would come in and carry off the prize? He would explain
all this to Lady Laura, and, if the prize would be kind to him, he
would disregard the anger of Lord Chiltern, even though it might be
anger to the knife.
As he was thinking of all this Lady Laura stood before him where he
was sitting at the top of the falls. At this moment he remembered
well all the circumstances of the scene when he had been there with
her at his last visit to Loughlinter. How things had changed since
then! Then he had loved Lady Laura with all his heart, and he had now
already brought himself to regard her as a discreet matron whom to
love would be almost as unreasonable as though he were to entertain
a passion for the Lord Chancellor. The reader will understand how
thorough had been the cure effected by Lady Laura's marriage and the
interval of a few months, when the swain was already prepared to make
this lady the depositary of his confidence in another matter of love.
"You are often here, I suppose?" said Lady Laura, looking down upon
him as he sat upon the rock.
"Well;--yes; not very often; I come here sometimes because the view
down upon the lake is so fine."
"It is the prettiest spot about the place. I hardly ever get here
now. Indeed this is only the second time that I have been up since
we have been at home, and then I came to bring papa here." There was
a little wooden seat near to the rock upon which Phineas had been
lying, and upon this Lady Laura sat down. Phineas, with his eyes
turned upon the lake, was considering how he might introduce the
subject of his love for Violet Effingham; but he did not find the
matter very easy. He had just resolved to begin by saying that Violet
would certainly never accept Lord Chiltern, when Lady Laura spoke a
word or two which stopped him altogether. "How well I remember," she
said, "the day when you and I were here last autumn!"
"So do I. You told me then that you were going to marry Mr. Kennedy.
How much has happened since then!"
"Much indeed! Enough for a whole lifetime. And yet how slow the time
has gone!"
"I do not think it has been slow with me," said Phineas.
"No; you have been active. You have had your hands full of work. I
am beginning to think that it is a great curse to have been born a
woman."
"And yet I have heard you say that a woman may do as much as a man."
"That was before I had learned my lesson properly. I know better than
that now. Oh dear! I have no doubt it is all for the best as it is,
but I have a kind of wish that I might be allowed to go out and milk
the cows."
"And may you not milk the cows if you wish it, Lady Laura?"
"By no means;--not only not milk them, but hardly look at them. At
any rate, I must not talk about them." Phineas of course understood
that she was complaining of her husband, and hardly knew how to reply
to her. He had been sharp enough to perceive already that Mr. Kennedy
was an autocrat in his own house, and he knew Lady Laura well enough
to be sure that such masterdom would be very irksome to her. But he
had not imagined that she would complain to him. "It was so different
at Saulsby," Lady Laura continued. "Everything there seemed to be my
own."
"And everything here is your own."
"Yes,--according to the prayer-book. And everything in truth is my
own,--as all the dainties at the banquet belonged to Sancho the
Governor."
"You mean," said he,--and then he hesitated; "you mean that Mr.
Kennedy stands over you, guarding you for your own welfare, as the
doctor stood over Sancho and guarded him?"
There was a pause before she answered,--a long pause, during which he
was looking away over the lake, and thinking how he might introduce
the subject of his love. But long as was the pause, he had not begun
when Lady Laura was again speaking. "The truth is, my friend," she
said, "that I have made a mistake."
"A mistake?"
"Yes, Phineas, a mistake. I have blundered as fools blunder, thinking
that I was clever enough to pick my footsteps aright without asking
counsel from any one. I have blundered and stumbled and fallen, and
now I am so bruised that I am not able to stand upon my feet." The
word that struck him most in all this was his own Christian name. She
had never called him Phineas before. He was aware that the circle
of his acquaintance had fallen into a way of miscalling him by his
Christian name, as one observes to be done now and again in reference
to some special young man. Most of the men whom he called his friends
called him Phineas. Even the Earl had done so more than once on
occasions in which the greatness of his position had dropped for a
moment out of his mind. Mrs. Low had called him Phineas when she
regarded him as her husband's most cherished pupil; and Mrs. Bunce
had called him Mr. Phineas. He had always been Phineas to everybody
at Killaloe. But still he was quite sure that Lady Laura had never so
called him before. Nor would she have done so now in her husband's
presence. He was sure of that also.
"You mean that you are unhappy?" he said, still looking away from her
towards the lake.
"Yes, I do mean that. Though I do not know why I should come and tell
you so,--except that I am still blundering and stumbling, and have
fallen into a way of hurting myself at every step."
"You can tell no one who is more anxious for your happiness," said
Phineas.
"That is a very pretty speech, but what would you do for my
happiness? Indeed, what is it possible that you should do? I mean it
as no rebuke when I say that my happiness or unhappiness is a matter
as to which you will soon become perfectly indifferent."
"Why should you say so, Lady Laura?"
"Because it is natural that it should be so. You and Mr. Kennedy
might have been friends. Not that you will be, because you are unlike
each other in all your ways. But it might have been so."
"And are not you and I to be friends?" he asked.
"No. In a very few months you will not think of telling me what are
your desires or what your sorrows;--and as for me, it will be out
of the question that I should tell mine to you. How can you be my
friend?"
"If you were not quite sure of my friendship, Lady Laura, you would
not speak to me as you are speaking now." Still he did not look at
her, but lay with his face supported on his hands, and his eyes
turned away upon the lake. But she, where she was sitting, could see
him, and was aided by her sight in making comparisons in her mind
between the two men who had been her lovers,--between him whom she
had taken and him whom she had left. There was something in the hard,
dry, unsympathising, unchanging virtues of her husband which almost
revolted her. He had not a fault, but she had tried him at every
point and had been able to strike no spark of fire from him. Even by
disobeying she could produce no heat,--only an access of firmness.
How would it have been with her had she thrown all ideas of fortune
to the winds, and linked her lot to that of the young Phoebus who
was lying at her feet? If she had ever loved any one she had loved
him. And she had not thrown away her love for money. So she swore to
herself over and over again, trying to console herself in her cold
unhappiness. She had married a rich man in order that she might be
able to do something in the world;--and now that she was this rich
man's wife she found that she could do nothing. The rich man thought
it to be quite enough for her to sit at home and look after his
welfare. In the meantime young Phoebus,--her Phoebus as he had
been once,--was thinking altogether of some one else.
"Phineas," she said, slowly, "I have in you such perfect confidence
that I will tell you the truth;--as one man may tell it to another. I
wish you would go from here."
"What, at once?"
"Not to-day, or to-morrow. Stay here now till the election; but do
not return. He will ask you to come, and press you hard, and will be
hurt;--for, strange to say, with all his coldness, he really likes
you. He has a pleasure in seeing you here. But he must not have that
pleasure at the expense of trouble to me."
"And why is it a trouble to you?" he asked. Men are such fools;--so
awkward, so unready, with their wits ever behind the occasion by a
dozen seconds or so! As soon as the words were uttered, he knew that
they should not have been spoken.
"Because I am a fool," she said. "Why else? Is not that enough for
you?"
"Laura--," he said.
"No,--no; I will have none of that. I am a fool, but not such a fool
as to suppose that any cure is to be found there."
"Only say what I can do for you, though it be with my entire life,
and I will do it."
"You can do nothing,--except to keep away from me."
"Are you earnest in telling me that?" Now at last he had turned
himself round and was looking at her, and as he looked he saw the hat
of a man appearing up the path, and immediately afterwards the face.
It was the hat and face of the laird of Loughlinter. "Here is Mr.
Kennedy," said Phineas, in a tone of voice not devoid of dismay and
trouble.
"So I perceive," said Lady Laura. But there was no dismay or trouble
in the tone of her voice.
In the countenance of Mr. Kennedy, as he approached closer, there was
not much to be read,--only, perhaps, some slight addition of gloom,
or rather, perhaps, of that frigid propriety of moral demeanour for
which he had always been conspicuous, which had grown upon him at his
marriage, and which had been greatly increased by the double action
of being made a Cabinet Minister and being garrotted. "I am glad that
your headache is better," he said to his wife, who had risen from
her seat to meet him. Phineas also had risen, and was now looking
somewhat sheepish where he stood.
"I came out because it was worse," she said. "It irritated me so that
I could not stand the house any longer."
"I will send to Callender for Dr. Macnuthrie."
"Pray do nothing of the kind, Robert. I do not want Dr. Macnuthrie at
all."
"Where there is illness, medical advice is always expedient."
"I am not ill. A headache is not illness."
"I had thought it was," said Mr. Kennedy, very drily.
"At any rate, I would rather not have Dr. Macnuthrie."
"I am sure it cannot do you any good to climb up here in the heat of
the sun. Had you been here long, Finn?"
"All the morning;--here, or hereabouts. I clambered up from the lake
and had a book in my pocket."
"And you happened to come across him by accident?" Mr. Kennedy
asked. There was something so simple in the question that its very
simplicity proved that there was no suspicion.
"Yes;--by chance," said Lady Laura. "But every one at Loughlinter
always comes up here. If any one ever were missing whom I wanted to
find, this is where I should look."
"I am going on towards Linter forest to meet Blane," said Mr.
Kennedy. Blane was the gamekeeper. "If you don't mind the trouble,
Finn, I wish you'd take Lady Laura down to the house. Do not let her
stay out in the heat. I will take care that somebody goes over to
Callender for Dr. Macnuthrie." Then Mr. Kennedy went on, and Phineas
was left with the charge of taking Lady Laura back to the house. When
Mr. Kennedy's hat had first appeared coming up the walk, Phineas
had been ready to proclaim himself prepared for any devotion in the
service of Lady Laura. Indeed, he had begun to reply with criminal
tenderness to the indiscreet avowal which Lady Laura had made to
him. But he felt now, after what had just occurred in the husband's
presence, that any show of tenderness,--of criminal tenderness,--was
impossible. The absence of all suspicion on the part of Mr. Kennedy
had made Phineas feel that he was bound by all social laws to refrain
from such tenderness. Lady Laura began to descend the path before
him without a word;--and went on, and on, as though she would have
reached the house without speaking, had he not addressed her. "Does
your head still pain you?" he asked.
"Of course it does."
"I suppose he is right in saying that you should not be out in the
heat."
"I do not know. It is not worth while to think about that. He sends
me in, and so of course I must go. And he tells you to take me, and
so of course you must take me."
"Would you wish that I should let you go alone?"
"Yes, I would. Only he will be sure to find it out; and you must not
tell him that you left me at my request."
"Do you think that I am afraid of him?" said Phineas.
"Yes;--I think you are. I know that I am, and that papa is; and that
his mother hardly dares to call her soul her own. I do not know why
you should escape."
"Mr. Kennedy is nothing to me."
"He is something to me, and so I suppose I had better go on. And
now I shall have that horrid man from the little town pawing me
and covering everything with snuff, and bidding me take Scotch
physic,--which seems to increase in quantity and nastiness as doses
in England decrease. And he will stand over me to see that I take
it."
"What;--the doctor from Callender?"
"No;--but Mr. Kennedy will. If he advised me to have a hole in my
glove mended, he would ask me before he went to bed whether it was
done. He never forgot anything in his life, and was never unmindful
of anything. That I think will do, Mr. Finn. You have brought me out
from the trees, and that may be taken as bringing me home. We shall
hardly get scolded if we part here. Remember what I told you up
above. And remember also that it is in your power to do nothing else
for me. Good-bye." So he turned away towards the lake, and let Lady
Laura go across the wide lawn to the house by herself.
He had failed altogether in his intention of telling his friend of
his love for Violet, and had come to perceive that he could not for
the present carry out that intention. After what had passed it would
be impossible for him to go to Lady Laura with a passionate tale of
his longing for Violet Effingham. If he were even to speak to her of
love at all, it must be quite of another love than that. But he never
would speak to her of love; nor,--as he felt quite sure,--would she
allow him to do so. But what astounded him most as he thought of the
interview which had just passed, was the fact that the Lady Laura
whom he had known,--whom he had thought he had known,--should have
become so subject to such a man as Mr. Kennedy, a man whom he had
despised as being weak, irresolute, and without a purpose! For the
day or two that he remained at Loughlinter, he watched the family
closely, and became aware that Lady Laura had been right when she
declared that her father was afraid of Mr. Kennedy.
"I shall follow you almost immediately," said the Earl confidentially
to Phineas, when the candidate for the borough took his departure
from Loughlinter. "I don't like to be there just when the election is
going on, but I'll be at Saulsby to receive you the day afterwards."
Phineas took his leave from Mr. Kennedy, with a warm expression of
friendship on the part of his host, and from Lady Laura with a mere
touch of the hand. He tried to say a word; but she was sullen, or, if
not, she put on some mood like to sullenness, and said never a word
to him.
On the day after the departure of Phineas Finn for Loughton Lady
Laura Kennedy still had a headache. She had complained of a headache
ever since she had been at Loughlinter, and Dr. Macnuthrie had been
over more than once. "I wonder what it is that ails you," said her
husband, standing over her in her own sitting-room up-stairs. It was
a pretty room, looking away to the mountains, with just a glimpse of
the lake to be caught from the window, and it had been prepared for
her with all the skill and taste of an accomplished upholsterer. She
had selected the room for herself soon after her engagement, and had
thanked her future husband with her sweetest smile for giving her
the choice. She had thanked him and told him that she always meant
to be happy,--so happy in that room! He was a man not much given to
romance, but he thought of this promise as he stood over her and
asked after her health. As far as he could see she had never been
even comfortable since she had been at Loughlinter. A shadow of the
truth came across his mind. Perhaps his wife was bored. If so, what
was to be the future of his life and of hers? He went up to London
every year, and to Parliament, as a duty; and then, during some
period of the recess, would have his house full of guests,--as
another duty. But his happiness was to consist in such hours as these
which seemed to inflict upon his wife the penalty of a continual
headache. A shadow of the truth came upon him. What if his wife did
not like living quietly at home as the mistress of her husband's
house? What if a headache was always to be the result of a simple
performance of domestic duties?
More than a shadow of truth had come upon Lady Laura herself.
The dark cloud created by the entire truth was upon her, making
everything black and wretched around her. She had asked herself a
question or two, and had discovered that she had no love for her
husband, that the kind of life which he intended to exact from her
was insupportable to her, and that she had blundered and fallen in
her entrance upon life. She perceived that her father had already
become weary of Mr. Kennedy, and that, lonely and sad as he would
be at Saulsby by himself, it was his intention to repudiate the
idea of making a home at Loughlinter. Yes;--she would be deserted by
everyone, except of course by her husband; and then-- Then she would
throw herself on some early morning into the lake, for life would be
insupportable.
"I wonder what it is that ails you," said Mr. Kennedy.
"Nothing serious. One can't always help having a headache, you know."
"I don't think you take enough exercise, Laura. I would propose that
you should walk four miles every day after breakfast. I will always
be ready to accompany you. I have spoken to Dr. Macnuthrie--"
"I hate Dr. Macnuthrie."
"Why should you hate Dr. Macnuthrie, Laura?"
"How can I tell why? I do. That is quite reason enough why you should
not send for him to me."
"You are unreasonable, Laura. One chooses a doctor on account of
his reputation in his profession, and that of Dr. Macnuthrie stands
high."
"I do not want any doctor."
"But if you are ill, my dear--"
"I am not ill."
"But you said you had a headache. You have said so for the last ten
days."
"Having a headache is not being ill. I only wish you would not talk
of it, and then perhaps I should get rid of it."
"I cannot believe that. Headache in nine cases out of ten comes from
the stomach." Though he said this,--saying it because it was the
common-place common-sense sort of thing to say, still at the very
moment there was the shadow of the truth before his eyes. What if
this headache meant simple dislike to him, and to his modes of life?
"It is nothing of that sort," said Lady Laura, impatient at having
her ailment inquired into with so much accuracy.
"Then what is it? You cannot think that I can be happy to hear you
complaining of headache every day,--making it an excuse for absolute
idleness."
"What is it that you want me to do?" she said, jumping up from her
seat. "Set me a task, and if I don't go mad over it, I'll get through
it. There are the account books. Give them to me. I don't suppose I
can see the figures, but I'll try to see them."
"Laura, this is unkind of you,--and ungrateful."
"Of course;--it is everything that is bad. What a pity that you did
not find it out last year! Oh dear, oh dear! what am I to do?" Then
she threw herself down upon the sofa, and put both her hands up to
her temples.
"I will send for Dr. Macnuthrie at once," said Mr. Kennedy, walking
towards the door very slowly, and speaking as slowly as he walked.
"No;--do no such thing," she said, springing to her feet again and
intercepting him before he reached the door. "If he comes I will not
see him. I give you my word that I will not speak to him if he comes.
You do not understand," she said; "you do not understand at all."
"What is it that I ought to understand?" he asked.
"That a woman does not like to be bothered."
He made no reply at once, but stood there twisting the handle of the
door, and collecting his thoughts. "Yes," said he at last; "I am
beginning to find that out;--and to find out also what it is that
bothers a woman, as you call it. I can see now what it is that makes
your head ache. It is not the stomach. You are quite right there. It
is the prospect of a quiet decent life, to which would be attached
the performance of certain homely duties. Dr. Macnuthrie is a learned
man, but I doubt whether he can do anything for such a malady."
"You are quite right, Robert; he can do nothing."
"It is a malady you must cure for yourself, Laura;--and which is to
be cured by perseverance. If you can bring yourself to try--"
"But I cannot bring myself to try at all," she said.
"Do you mean to tell me, Laura, that you will make no effort to do
your duty as my wife?"
"I mean to tell you that I will not try to cure a headache by doing
sums. That is all that I mean to say at this moment. If you will
leave me for awhile, so that I may lie down, perhaps I shall be able
to come to dinner." He still hesitated, standing with the door in his
hand. "But if you go on scolding me," she continued, "what I shall
do is to go to bed directly you go away." He hesitated for a moment
longer, and then left the room without another word.
CHAPTER XXXIII
Mr. Slide's Grievance
Our hero was elected member for Loughton without any trouble to him
or, as far as he could see, to any one else. He made one speech from
a small raised booth that was called a platform, and that was all
that he was called upon to do. Mr. Grating made a speech in proposing
him, and Mr. Shortribs another in seconding him; and these were all
the speeches that were required. The thing seemed to be so very easy
that he was afterwards almost offended when he was told that the bill
for so insignificant a piece of work came to £247 13s. 9d. He had
seen no occasion for spending even the odd forty-seven pounds. But
then he was member for Loughton; and as he passed the evening alone
at the inn, having dined in company with Messrs. Grating, Shortribs,
and sundry other influential electors, he began to reflect that,
after all, it was not so very great a thing to be a member of
Parliament. It almost seemed that that which had come to him so
easily could not be of much value.
On the following day he went to the castle, and was there when the
Earl arrived. They two were alone together, and the Earl was very
kind to him. "So you had no opponent after all," said the great man
of Loughton, with a slight smile.
"Not the ghost of another candidate."
"I did not think there would be. They have tried it once or twice and
have always failed. There are only one or two in the place who like
to go one way just because their neighbours go the other. But, in
truth, there is no conservative feeling in the place!"
Phineas, although he was at the present moment the member for
Loughton himself, could not but enjoy the joke of this. Could there
be any liberal feeling in such a place, or, indeed, any political
feeling whatsoever? Would not Messrs. Grating and Shortribs have done
just the same had it happened that Lord Brentford had been a Tory
peer? "They all seemed to be very obliging," said Phineas, in answer
to the Earl.
"Yes, they are. There isn't a house in the town, you know, let
for longer than seven years, and most of them merely from year to
year. And, do you know, I haven't a farmer on the property with a
lease,--not one; and they don't want leases. They know they're safe.
But I do like the people round me to be of the same way of thinking
as myself about politics."
On the second day after dinner,--the last evening of Finn's visit to
Saulsby,--the Earl fell suddenly into a confidential conversation
about his daughter and his son, and about Violet Effingham. So
sudden, indeed, and so confidential was the conversation, that
Phineas was almost silenced for awhile. A word or two had been said
about Loughlinter, of the beauty of the place and of the vastness of
the property. "I am almost afraid," said Lord Brentford, "that Laura
is not happy there."
"I hope she is," said Phineas.
"He is so hard and dry, and what I call exacting. That is just the
word for it. Now Laura has never been used to that. With me she
always had her own way in everything, and I always found her fit
to have it. I do not understand why her husband should treat her
differently."
"Perhaps it is the temper of the man."
"Temper, yes; but what a bad prospect is that for her! And she, too,
has a temper, and so he will find if he tries her too far. I cannot
stand Loughlinter. I told Laura so fairly. It is one of those houses
in which a man cannot call his hours his own. I told Laura that I
could not undertake to remain there for above a day or two."
"It is very sad," said Phineas.
"Yes, indeed; it is sad for her, poor girl; and very sad for me too.
I have no one else but Laura,--literally no one; and now I am divided
from her! It seems that she has been taken as much away from me as
though her husband lived in China. I have lost them both now!"
"I hope not, my lord."
"I say I have. As to Chiltern, I can perceive that he becomes more
and more indifferent to me every day. He thinks of me only as a man
in his way who must die some day and may die soon."
"You wrong him, Lord Brentford."
"I do not wrong him at all. Why has he answered every offer I have
made him with so much insolence as to make it impossible for me to
put myself into further communion with him?"
"He thinks that you have wronged him."
"Yes;--because I have been unable to shut my eyes to his mode of
living. I was to go on paying his debts, and taking no other notice
whatsoever of his conduct!"
"I do not think he is in debt now."
"Because his sister the other day spent every shilling of her fortune
in paying them. She gave him £40,000! Do you think she would have
married Kennedy but for that? I don't. I could not prevent her. I had
said that I would not cripple my remaining years of life by raising
the money, and I could not go back from my word."
"You and Chiltern might raise the money between you."
"It would do no good now. She has married Mr. Kennedy, and the money
is nothing to her or to him. Chiltern might have put things right by
marrying Miss Effingham if he pleased."
"I think he did his best there."
"No;--he did his worst. He asked her to be his wife as a man asks for
a railway-ticket or a pair of gloves, which he buys with a price;
and because she would not jump into his mouth he gave it up. I don't
believe he even really wanted to marry her. I suppose he has some
disreputable connection to prevent it."
"Nothing of the kind. He would marry her to-morrow if he could. My
belief is that Miss Effingham is sincere in refusing him."
"I don't doubt her sincerity."
"And that she will never change."
"Ah, well; I don't agree with you, and I daresay I know them both
better than you do. But everything goes against me. I had set my
heart upon it, and therefore of course I shall be disappointed. What
is he going to do this autumn?"
"He is yachting now."
"And who are with him?"
"I think the boat belongs to Captain Colepepper."
"The greatest blackguard in all England! A man who shoots pigeons and
rides steeple-chases! And the worst of Chiltern is this, that even if
he didn't like the man, and if he were tired of this sort of life, he
would go on just the same because he thinks it a fine thing not to
give way." This was so true that Phineas did not dare to contradict
the statement, and therefore said nothing. "I had some faint hope,"
continued the Earl, "while Laura could always watch him; because, in
his way, he was fond of his sister. But that is all over now. She
will have enough to do to watch herself!"
Phineas had felt that the Earl had put him down rather sharply when
he had said that Violet would never accept Lord Chiltern, and he was
therefore not a little surprised when Lord Brentford spoke again of
Miss Effingham the following morning, holding in his hand a letter
which he had just received from her. "They are to be at Loughlinter
on the tenth," he said, "and she purposes to come here for a couple
of nights on her way."
"Lady Baldock and all?"
"Well, yes; Lady Baldock and all. I am not very fond of Lady Baldock,
but I will put up with her for a couple of days for the sake of
having Violet. She is more like a child of my own now than anybody
else. I shall not see her all the autumn afterwards. I cannot stand
Loughlinter."
"It will be better when the house is full."
"You will be there, I suppose?"
"Well, no; I think not," said Phineas.
"You have had enough of it, have you?" Phineas made no reply to this,
but smiled slightly. "By Jove, I don't wonder at it," said the Earl.
Phineas, who would have given all he had in the world to be staying
in the same country house with Violet Effingham, could not explain
how it had come to pass that he was obliged to absent himself. "I
suppose you were asked?" said the Earl.
"Oh, yes, I was asked. Nothing can be kinder than they are."
"Kennedy told me that you were coming as a matter of course."
"I explained to him after that," said Phineas, "that I should not
return. I shall go over to Ireland. I have a deal of hard reading to
do, and I can get through it there without interruption."
He went up from Saulsby to London on that day, and found himself
quite alone in Mrs. Bunce's lodgings. I mean not only that he was
alone at his lodgings, but he was alone at his club, and alone in the
streets. July was not quite over, and yet all the birds of passage
had migrated. Mr. Mildmay, by his short session, had half ruined the
London tradesmen, and had changed the summer mode of life of all
those who account themselves to be anybody. Phineas, as he sat alone
in his room, felt himself to be nobody. He had told the Earl that
he was going to Ireland, and to Ireland he must go;--because he had
nothing else to do. He had been asked indeed to join one or two
parties in their autumn plans. Mr. Monk had wanted him to go to the
Pyrenees, and Lord Chiltern had suggested that he should join the
yacht;--but neither plan suited him. It would have suited him to be
at Loughlinter with Violet Effingham, but Loughlinter was a barred
house to him. His old friend, Lady Laura, had told him not to come
thither, explaining, with sufficient clearness, her reasons for
excluding him from the number of her husband's guests. As he thought
of it the past scenes of his life became very marvellous to him.
Twelve months since he would have given all the world for a word of
love from Lady Laura, and had barely dared to hope that such a word,
at some future day, might possibly be spoken. Now such a word had in
truth been spoken, and it had come to be simply a trouble to him. She
had owned to him,--for, in truth, such had been the meaning of her
warning to him,--that, though she had married another man, she had
loved and did love him. But in thinking of this he took no pride in
it. It was not till he had thought of it long that he began to ask
himself whether he might not be justified in gathering from what
happened some hope that Violet also might learn to love him. He had
thought so little of himself as to have been afraid at first to press
his suit with Lady Laura. Might he not venture to think more of
himself, having learned how far he had succeeded?
But how was he to get at Violet Effingham? From the moment at which
he had left Saulsby he had been angry with himself for not having
asked Lord Brentford to allow him to remain there till after the
Baldock party should have gone on to Loughlinter. The Earl, who was
very lonely in his house, would have consented at once. Phineas,
indeed, was driven to confess to himself that success with Violet
would at once have put an end to all his friendship with Lord
Brentford;--as also to all his friendship with Lord Chiltern. He
would, in such case, be bound in honour to vacate his seat and give
back Loughton to his offended patron. But he would have given up much
more than his seat for Violet Effingham! At present, however, he had
no means of getting at her to ask her the question. He could hardly
go to Loughlinter in opposition to the wishes of Lady Laura.
A little adventure happened to him in London which somewhat relieved
the dulness of the days of the first week in August. He remained in
London till the middle of August, half resolving to rush down to
Saulsby when Violet Effingham should be there,--endeavouring to
find some excuse for such a proceeding, but racking his brains in
vain,--and then there came about his little adventure. The adventure
was commenced by the receipt of the following letter:--
Banner of the People Office,
3rd August, 186--.
MY DEAR FINN,
I must say I think you have treated me badly, and without
that sort of brotherly fairness which we on the public
press expect from one another. However, perhaps we can
come to an understanding, and if so, things may yet go
smoothly. Give me a turn and I am not at all adverse to
give you one. Will you come to me here, or shall I call
upon you?
Yours always, Q. S.
Phineas was not only surprised, but disgusted also, at the receipt
of this letter. He could not imagine what was the deed by which he
had offended Mr. Slide. He thought over all the circumstances of
his short connection with the _People's Banner_, but could remember
nothing which might have created offence. But his disgust was greater
than his surprise. He thought that he had done nothing and said
nothing to justify Quintus Slide in calling him "dear Finn." He,
who had Lady Laura's secret in his keeping; he who hoped to be the
possessor of Violet Effingham's affections,--he to be called "dear
Finn" by such a one as Quintus Slide! He soon made up his mind that
he would not answer the note, but would go at once to the _People's
Banner_ office at the hour at which Quintus Slide was always there.
He certainly would not write to "dear Slide;" and, until he had heard
something more of this cause of offence, he would not make an enemy
for ever by calling the man "dear Sir." He went to the office of the
_People's Banner_, and found Mr. Slide ensconced in a little glass
cupboard, writing an article for the next day's copy.
"I suppose you're very busy," said Phineas, inserting himself with
some difficulty on to a little stool in the corner of the cupboard.
"Not so particular but what I'm glad to see you. You shoot, don't
you?"
"Shoot!" said Phineas. It could not be possible that Mr. Slide was
intending, after this abrupt fashion, to propose a duel with pistols.
"Grouse and pheasants, and them sort of things?" asked Mr. Slide.
"Oh, ah; I understand. Yes, I shoot sometimes."
"Is it the 12th or 20th for grouse in Scotland?"
"The 12th," said Phineas. "What makes you ask that just now?"
"I'm doing a letter about it,--advising men not to shoot too many of
the young birds, and showing that they'll have none next year if they
do. I had a fellow here just now who knew all about it, and he put
down a lot; but I forgot to make him tell me the day of beginning.
What's a good place to date from?"
Phineas suggested Callender or Stirling.
"Stirling's too much of a town, isn't it? Callender sounds better for
game, I think."
So the letter which was to save the young grouse was dated from
Callender; and Mr. Quintus Slide having written the word, threw down
his pen, came off his stool, and rushed at once at his subject.
"Well, now, Finn," he said, "don't you know that you've treated me
badly about Loughton?"
"Treated you badly about Loughton!" Phineas, as he repeated the
words, was quite in the dark as to Mr. Slide's meaning. Did Mr. Slide
intend to convey a reproach because Phineas had not personally sent
some tidings of the election to the _People's Banner_?
"Very badly," said Mr. Slide, with his arms akimbo,--"very badly
indeed! Men on the press together do expect that they're to be
stuck by, and not thrown over. Damn it, I say; what's the good of a
brotherhood if it ain't to be brotherhood?"
"Upon my word, I don't know what you mean," said Phineas.
"Didn't I tell you that I had Loughton in my heye?" said Quintus.
"Oh--h!"
"It's very well to say ho, and look guilty, but didn't I tell you?"
"I never heard such nonsense in my life."
"Nonsense?"
"How on earth could you have stood for Loughton? What interest would
you have there? You could not even have found an elector to propose
you."
"Now, I'll tell you what I'll do, Finn. I think you have thrown
me over most shabby, but I won't stand about that. You shall have
Loughton this session if you'll promise to make way for me after the
next election. If you'll agree to that, we'll have a special leader
to say how well Lord What's-his-name has done with the borough; and
we'll be your horgan through the whole session."
"I never heard such nonsense in my life. In the first place, Loughton
is safe to be in the schedule of reduced boroughs. It will be thrown
into the county, or joined with a group."
"I'll stand the chance of that. Will you agree?"
"Agree! No! It's the most absurd proposal that was ever made. You
might as well ask me whether I would agree that you should go to
heaven. Go to heaven if you can, I should say. I have not the
slightest objection. But it's nothing to me."
"Very well," said Quintus Slide. "Very well! Now we understand each
other, and that's all that I desire. I think that I can show you what
it is to come among gentlemen of the press, and then to throw them
over. Good morning."
Phineas, quite satisfied at the result of the interview as regarded
himself, and by no means sorry that there should have arisen a
cause of separation between Mr. Quintus Slide and his "dear Finn,"
shook off a little dust from his foot as he left the office of the
_People's Banner_, and resolved that in future he would attempt to
make no connection in that direction. As he returned home he told
himself that a member of Parliament should be altogether independent
of the press. On the second morning after his meeting with his late
friend, he saw the result of his independence. There was a startling
article, a tremendous article, showing the pressing necessity of
immediate reform, and proving the necessity by an illustration of
the borough-mongering rottenness of the present system. When such
a patron as Lord Brentford,--himself a Cabinet Minister with a
sinecure,--could by his mere word put into the House such a stick as
Phineas Finn,--a man who had struggled to stand on his legs before
the Speaker, but had wanted both the courage and the capacity,
nothing further could surely be wanted to prove that the Reform Bill
of 1832 required to be supplemented by some more energetic measure.
Phineas laughed as he read the article, and declared to himself that
the joke was a good joke. But, nevertheless, he suffered. Mr. Quintus
Slide, when he was really anxious to use his thong earnestly, could
generally raise a wale.
CHAPTER XXXIV
Was He Honest?
On the 10th of August, Phineas Finn did return to Loughton. He went
down by the mail train on the night of the 10th, having telegraphed
to the inn for a bed, and was up eating his breakfast in that
hospitable house at nine o'clock. The landlord and landlady with all
their staff were at a loss to imagine what had brought down their
member again so quickly to his borough; but the reader, who will
remember that Lady Baldock with her daughter and Violet Effingham
were to pass the 11th of the month at Saulsby, may perhaps be able
to make a guess on the subject.
Phineas had been thinking of making this sudden visit to Loughton
ever since he had been up in town, but he could suggest to himself no
reason to be given to Lord Brentford for his sudden reappearance. The
Earl had been very kind to him, but he had said nothing which could
justify his young friend in running in and out of Saulsby Castle at
pleasure, without invitation and without notice. Phineas was so well
aware of this himself that often as he had half resolved during the
last ten days to return to Saulsby, so often had he determined that
he could not do so. He could think of no excuse. Then the heavens
favoured him, and he received a letter from Lord Chiltern, in which
there was a message for Lord Brentford. "If you see my father, tell
him that I am ready at any moment to do what is necessary for raising
the money for Laura." Taking this as his excuse he returned to
Loughton.
As chance arranged it, he met the Earl standing on the great steps
before his own castle doors. "What, Finn; is this you? I thought you
were in Ireland."
"Not yet, my lord, as you see." Then he opened his budget at once,
and blushed at his own hypocrisy as he went on with his story. He
had, he said, felt the message from Chiltern to be so all-important
that he could not bring himself to go over to Ireland without
delivering it. He urged upon the Earl that he might learn from this
how anxious Lord Chiltern was to effect a reconciliation. When
it occurred to him, he said, that there might be a hope of doing
anything towards such an object, he could not go to Ireland leaving
the good work behind him. In love and war all things are fair. So he
declared to himself; but as he did so he felt that his story was so
weak that it would hardly gain for him an admittance into the Castle.
In this he was completely wrong. The Earl, swallowing the bait, put
his arm through that of the intruder, and, walking with him through
the paths of the shrubbery, at length confessed that he would be glad
to be reconciled to his son if it were possible. "Let him come here,
and she shall be here also," said the Earl, speaking of Violet. To
this Phineas could say nothing out loud, but he told himself that all
should be fair between them. He would take no dishonest advantage of
Lord Chiltern. He would give Lord Chiltern the whole message as it
was given to him by Lord Brentford. But should it so turn out that he
himself got an opportunity of saying to Violet all that he had come
to say, and should it also turn out,--an event which he acknowledged
to himself to be most unlikely,--that Violet did not reject him, then
how could he write his letter to Lord Chiltern? So he resolved that
the letter should be written before he saw Violet. But how could he
write such a letter and instantly afterwards do that which would
be false to the spirit of a letter so written? Could he bid Lord
Chiltern come home to woo Violet Effingham, and instantly go forth
to woo her for himself? He found that he could not do so,--unless he
told the whole truth to Lord Chiltern. In no other way could he carry
out his project and satisfy his own idea of what was honest.
The Earl bade him send to the hotel for his things. "The Baldock
people are all here, you know, but they go very early to-morrow."
Then Phineas declared that he also must return to London very early
on the morrow;--but in the meantime he would go to the inn and fetch
his things. The Earl thanked him again and again for his generous
kindness; and Phineas, blushing as he received the thanks, went back
and wrote his letter to Lord Chiltern. It was an elaborate letter,
written, as regards the first and larger portion of it, with words
intended to bring the prodigal son back to the father's home. And
everything was said about Miss Effingham that could or should have
been said. Then, on the last page, he told his own story. "Now," he
said, "I must speak of myself:"--and he went on to explain to his
friend, in the plainest language that he could use, his own position.
"I have loved her," he said, "for six months, and I am here with
the express intention of asking her to take me. The chances are ten
to one that she refuses me. I do not deprecate your anger,--if you
choose to be angry. But I am endeavouring to treat you well, and I
ask you to do the same by me. I must convey to you your father's
message, and after doing so I cannot address myself to Miss Effingham
without telling you. I should feel myself to be false were I to do
so. In the event,--the probable, nay, almost certain event of my
being refused,--I shall trust you to keep my secret. Do not quarrel
with me if you can help it;--but if you must I will be ready." Then
he posted the letter and went up to the Castle.
He had only the one day for his action, and he knew that Violet was
watched by Lady Baldock as by a dragon. He was told that the Earl
was out with the young ladies, and was shown to his room. On going
to the drawing-room he found Lady Baldock, with whom he had been,
to a certain degree, a favourite, and was soon deeply engaged in
a conversation as to the practicability of shutting up all the
breweries and distilleries by Act of Parliament. But lunch relieved
him, and brought the young ladies in at two. Miss Effingham seemed
to be really glad to see him, and even Miss Boreham, Lady Baldock's
daughter, was very gracious to him. For the Earl had been speaking
well of his young member, and Phineas had in a way grown into the
good graces of sober and discreet people. After lunch they were to
ride;--the Earl, that is, and Violet. Lady Baldock and her daughter
were to have the carriage. "I can mount you, Finn, if you would like
it," said the Earl. "Of course he'll like it," said Violet; "do you
suppose Mr. Finn will object to ride with me in Saulsby Woods? It
won't be the first time, will it?" "Violet," said Lady Baldock, "you
have the most singular way of talking." "I suppose I have," said
Violet; "but I don't think I can change it now. Mr. Finn knows me too
well to mind it much."
It was past five before they were on horseback, and up to that time
Phineas had not found himself alone with Violet Effingham for a
moment. They had sat together after lunch in the dining-room for
nearly an hour, and had sauntered into the hall and knocked about
the billiard balls, and then stood together at the open doors of a
conservatory. But Lady Baldock or Miss Boreham had always been there.
Nothing could be more pleasant than Miss Effingham's words, or more
familiar than her manner to Phineas. She had expressed strong delight
at his success in getting a seat in Parliament, and had talked to him
about the Kennedys as though they had created some special bond of
union between her and Phineas which ought to make them intimate. But,
for all that, she could not be got to separate herself from Lady
Baldock;--and when she was told that if she meant to ride she must go
and dress herself, she went at once.
But he thought that he might have a chance on horseback; and after
they had been out about half an hour, chance did favour him. For
awhile he rode behind with the carriage, calculating that by his so
doing the Earl would be put off his guard, and would be disposed
after awhile to change places with him. And so it fell out. At a
certain fall of ground in the park, where the road turned round and
crossed a bridge over the little river, the carriage came up with the
first two horses, and Lady Baldock spoke a word to the Earl. Then
Violet pulled up, allowing the vehicle to pass the bridge first, and
in this way she and Phineas were brought together,--and in this way
they rode on. But he was aware that he must greatly increase the
distance between them and the others of their party before he could
dare to plead his suit, and even were that done he felt that he would
not know how to plead it on horseback.
They had gone on some half mile in this way when they reached a spot
on which a green ride led away from the main road through the trees
to the left. "You remember this place, do you not?" said Violet.
Phineas declared that he remembered it well. "I must go round by the
woodman's cottage. You won't mind coming?" Phineas said that he would
not mind, and trotted on to tell them in the carriage.
"Where is she going?" asked Lady Baldock; and then, when Phineas
explained, she begged the Earl to go back to Violet. The Earl,
feeling the absurdity of this, declared that Violet knew her way very
well herself, and thus Phineas got his opportunity.
They rode on almost without speaking for nearly a mile, cantering
through the trees, and then they took another turn to the right, and
came upon the cottage. They rode to the door, and spoke a word or two
to the woman there, and then passed on. "I always come here when I am
at Saulsby," said Violet, "that I may teach myself to think kindly of
Lord Chiltern."
"I understand it all," said Phineas.
"He used to be so nice;--and is so still, I believe, only that he has
taught himself to be so rough. Will he ever change, do you think?"
Phineas knew that in this emergency it was his especial duty to be
honest. "I think he would be changed altogether if we could bring him
here,--so that he should live among his friends."
"Do you think he would? We must put our heads together, and do it.
Don't you think that it is to be done?"
Phineas replied that he thought it was to be done. "I'll tell you the
truth at once, Miss Effingham," he said. "You can do it by a single
word."
"Yes;--yes;" she said; "but I do not mean that;--without that. It
is absurd, you know, that a father should make such a condition as
that." Phineas said that he thought it was absurd; and then they rode
on again, cantering through the wood. He had been bold to speak to
her about Lord Chiltern as he had done, and she had answered just as
he would have wished to be answered. But how could he press his suit
for himself while she was cantering by his side?
Presently they came to rough ground over which they were forced to
walk, and he was close by her side. "Mr. Finn," she said, "I wonder
whether I may ask a question?"
"Any question," he replied.
"Is there any quarrel between you and Lady Laura?"
"None."
"Or between you and him?"
"No;--none. We are greater allies than ever."
"Then why are you not going to be at Loughlinter? She has written to
me expressly saying you would not be there."
He paused a moment before he replied. "It did not suit," he said at
last.
"It is a secret then?"
"Yes;--it is a secret. You are not angry with me?"
"Angry; no."
"It is not a secret of my own, or I should not keep it from you."
"Perhaps I can guess it," she said. "But I will not try. I will not
even think of it."
"The cause, whatever it be, has been full of sorrow to me. I would
have given my left hand to have been at Loughlinter this autumn."
"Are you so fond of it?"
"I should have been staying there with you," he said. He paused, and
for a moment there was no word spoken by either of them; but he could
perceive that the hand in which she held her whip was playing with
her horse's mane with a nervous movement. "When I found how it must
be, and that I must miss you, I rushed down here that I might see
you for a moment. And now I am here I do not dare to speak to you of
myself." They were now beyond the rocks, and Violet, without speaking
a word, again put her horse into a trot. He was by her side in a
moment, but he could not see her face. "Have you not a word to say to
me?" he asked.
"No;--no;--no;" she replied, "not a word when you speak to me like
that. There is the carriage. Come;--we will join them." Then she
cantered on, and he followed her till they reached the Earl and Lady
Baldock and Miss Boreham. "I have done my devotions now," said Miss
Effingham, "and am ready to return to ordinary life."
Phineas could not find another moment in which to speak to her.
Though he spent the evening with her, and stood over her as she sang
at the Earl's request, and pressed her hand as she went to bed, and
was up to see her start in the morning, he could not draw from her
either a word or a look.
CHAPTER XXXV
Mr. Monk upon Reform
Phineas Finn went to Ireland immediately after his return from
Saulsby, having said nothing further to Violet Effingham, and having
heard nothing further from her than what is recorded in the last
chapter. He felt very keenly that his position was unsatisfactory,
and brooded over it all the autumn and early winter; but he could
form no plan for improving it. A dozen times he thought of writing
to Miss Effingham, and asking for an explicit answer. He could not,
however, bring himself to write the letter, thinking that written
expressions of love are always weak and vapid,--and deterred also
by a conviction that Violet, if driven to reply in writing, would
undoubtedly reply by a refusal. Fifty times he rode again in his
imagination his ride in Saulsby Wood, and he told himself as often
that the syren's answer to him,--her no, no, no,--had been, of all
possible answers, the most indefinite and provoking. The tone of her
voice as she galloped away from him, the bearing of her countenance
when he rejoined her, her manner to him when he saw her start from
the Castle in the morning, all forbade him to believe that his words
to her had been taken as an offence. She had replied to him with a
direct negative, simply with the word "no;" but she had so said it
that there had hardly been any sting in the no; and he had known at
the moment that whatever might be the result of his suit, he need not
regard Violet Effingham as his enemy.
But the doubt made his sojourn in Ireland very wearisome to him.
And there were other matters which tended also to his discomfort,
though he was not left even at this period of his life without a
continuation of success which seemed to be very wonderful. And,
first, I will say a word of his discomfort. He heard not a line from
Lord Chiltern in answer to the letter which he had written to his
lordship. From Lady Laura he did hear frequently. Lady Laura wrote to
him exactly as though she had never warned him away from Loughlinter,
and as though there had been no occasion for such warning. She sent
him letters filled chiefly with politics, saying something also of
the guests at Loughlinter, something of the game, and just a word
or two here and there of her husband. The letters were very good
letters, and he preserved them carefully. It was manifest to him that
they were intended to be good letters, and, as such, to be preserved.
In one of these, which he received about the end of November,
she told him that her brother was again in his old haunt, at the
Willingford Bull, and that he had sent to Portman Square for all
property of his own that had been left there. But there was no word
in that letter of Violet Effingham; and though Lady Laura did speak
more than once of Violet, she always did so as though Violet were
simply a joint acquaintance of herself and her correspondent. There
was no allusion to the existence of any special regard on his part
for Miss Effingham. He had thought that Violet might probably tell
her friend what had occurred at Saulsby;--but if she did so, Lady
Laura was happy in her powers of reticence. Our hero was disturbed
also when he reached home by finding that Mrs. Flood Jones and Miss
Flood Jones had retired from Killaloe for the winter. I do not know
whether he might not have been more disturbed by the presence of the
young lady, for he would have found himself constrained to exhibit
towards her some tenderness of manner; and any such tenderness of
manner would, in his existing circumstances, have been dangerous. But
he was made to understand that Mary Flood Jones had been taken away
from Killaloe because it was thought that he had ill-treated the
lady, and the accusation made him unhappy. In the middle of the heat
of the last session he had received a letter from his sister, in
which some pushing question had been asked as to his then existing
feeling about poor Mary. This he had answered petulantly. Nothing
more had been written to him about Miss Jones, and nothing was said
to him when he reached home. He could not, however, but ask after
Mary, and when he did ask, the accusation was made again in that
quietly severe manner with which, perhaps, most of us have been made
acquainted at some period of our lives. "I think, Phineas," said his
sister, "we had better say nothing about dear Mary. She is not here
at present, and probably you may not see her while you remain with
us." "What's all that about?" Phineas had demanded,--understanding
the whole matter thoroughly. Then his sister had demurely refused to
say a word further on the subject, and not a word further was said
about Miss Mary Flood Jones. They were at Floodborough, living, he
did not doubt, in a very desolate way,--and quite willing, he did not
doubt also, to abandon their desolation if he would go over there in
the manner that would become him after what had passed on one or two
occasions between him and the young lady. But how was he to do this
with such work on his hands as he had undertaken? Now that he was in
Ireland, he thought that he did love dear Mary very dearly. He felt
that he had two identities,--that he was, as it were, two separate
persons,--and that he could, without any real faithlessness, be very
much in love with Violet Effingham in his position of man of fashion
and member of Parliament in England, and also warmly attached to dear
little Mary Flood Jones as an Irishman of Killaloe. He was aware,
however, that there was a prejudice against such fulness of heart,
and, therefore, resolved sternly that it was his duty to be constant
to Miss Effingham. How was it possible that he should marry dear
Mary,--he, with such extensive jobs of work on his hands! It was not
possible. He must abandon all thought of making dear Mary his own. No
doubt they had been right to remove her. But, still, as he took his
solitary walks along the Shannon, and up on the hills that overhung
the lake above the town, he felt somewhat ashamed of himself, and
dreamed of giving up Parliament, of leaving Violet to some noble
suitor,--to Lord Chiltern, if she would take him,--and of going to
Floodborough with an honest proposal that he should be allowed to
press Mary to his heart. Miss Effingham would probably reject him
at last; whereas Mary, dear Mary, would come to his heart without
a scruple of doubt. Dear Mary! In these days of dreaming, he told
himself that, after all, dear Mary was his real love. But, of course,
such days were days of dreaming only. He had letters in his pocket
from Lady Laura Kennedy which made it impossible for him to think in
earnest of giving up Parliament.
And then there came a wonderful piece of luck in his way. There
lived, or had lived, in the town of Galway a very eccentric old lady,
one Miss Marian Persse, who was the aunt of Mrs. Finn, the mother
of our hero. With this lady Dr. Finn had quarrelled persistently
ever since his marriage, because the lady had expressed her wish to
interfere in the management of his family,--offering to purchase such
right by favourable arrangements in reference to her will. This the
doctor had resented, and there had been quarrels. Miss Persse was not
a very rich old lady, but she thought a good deal of her own money.
And now she died, leaving £3,000 to her nephew Phineas Finn. Another
sum of about equal amount she bequeathed to a Roman Catholic
seminary; and thus was her worldly wealth divided. "She couldn't
have done better with it," said the old doctor; "and as far as we
are concerned, the windfall is the more pleasant as being wholly
unexpected." In these days the doctor was undoubtedly gratified by
his son's success in life, and never said much about the law. Phineas
in truth did do some work during the autumn, reading blue-books,
reading law books, reading perhaps a novel or two at the same
time,--but shutting himself up very carefully as he studied, so that
his sisters were made to understand that for a certain four hours in
the day not a sound was to be allowed to disturb him.
On the receipt of his legacy he at once offered to repay his father
all money that had been advanced him over and above his original
allowance; but this the doctor refused to take. "It comes to the same
thing, Phineas," he said. "What you have of your share now you can't
have hereafter. As regards my present income, it has only made me
work a little longer than I had intended; and I believe that the
later in life a man works, the more likely he is to live." Phineas,
therefore, when he returned to London, had his £3,000 in his pocket.
He owed some £500; and the remainder he would, of course, invest.
There had been some talk of an autumnal session, but Mr. Mildmay's
decision had at last been against it. Who cannot understand that such
would be the decision of any Minister to whom was left the slightest
fraction of free will in the matter? Why should any Minister court
the danger of unnecessary attack, submit himself to unnecessary work,
and incur the odium of summoning all his friends from their rest?
In the midst of the doubts as to the new and old Ministry, when
the political needle was vacillating so tremulously on its pivot,
pointing now to one set of men as the coming Government and then to
another, vague suggestions as to an autumn session might be useful.
And they were thrown out in all good faith. Mr. Mildmay, when he
spoke on the subject to the Duke, was earnest in thinking that the
question of Reform should not be postponed even for six months.
"Don't pledge yourself," said the Duke;--and Mr. Mildmay did not
pledge himself. Afterwards, when Mr. Mildmay found that he was
once more assuredly Prime Minister, he changed his mind, and felt
himself to be under a fresh obligation to the Duke. Lord de Terrier
had altogether failed, and the country might very well wait till
February. The country did wait till February, somewhat to the
disappointment of Phineas Finn, who had become tired of blue-books
at Killaloe. The difference between his English life and his life at
home was so great, that it was hardly possible that he should not
become weary of the latter. He did become weary of it, but strove
gallantly to hide his weariness from his father and mother.
At this time the world was talking much about Reform, though Mr.
Mildmay had become placidly patient. The feeling was growing, and
Mr. Turnbull, with his friends, was doing all he could to make it
grow fast. There was a certain amount of excitement on the subject;
but the excitement had grown downwards, from the leaders to the
people,--from the self-instituted leaders of popular politics down,
by means of the press, to the ranks of working men, instead of
growing upwards, from the dissatisfaction of the masses, till it
expressed itself by this mouthpiece and that, chosen by the people
themselves. There was no strong throb through the country, making
men feel that safety was to be had by Reform, and could not be had
without Reform. But there was an understanding that the press and the
orators were too strong to be ignored, and that some new measure of
Reform must be conceded to them. The sooner the concession was made,
the less it might be necessary to concede. And all men of all parties
were agreed on this point. That Reform was in itself odious to many
of those who spoke of it freely, who offered themselves willingly to
be its promoters, was acknowledged. It was not only odious to Lord de
Terrier and to most of those who worked with him, but was equally so
to many of Mr. Mildmay's most constant supporters. The Duke had no
wish for Reform. Indeed it is hard to suppose that such a Duke can
wish for any change in a state of things that must seem to him to be
so salutary. Workmen were getting full wages. Farmers were paying
their rent. Capitalists by the dozen were creating capitalists by the
hundreds. Nothing was wrong in the country, but the over-dominant
spirit of speculative commerce;--and there was nothing in Reform to
check that. Why should the Duke want Reform? As for such men as Lord
Brentford, Sir Harry Coldfoot, Lord Plinlimmon, and Mr. Legge Wilson,
it was known to all men that they advocated Reform as we all of us
advocate doctors. Some amount of doctoring is necessary for us. We
may hardly hope to avoid it. But let us have as little of the doctor
as possible. Mr. Turnbull, and the cheap press, and the rising spirit
of the loudest among the people, made it manifest that something must
be conceded. Let us be generous in our concession. That was now the
doctrine of many,--perhaps of most of the leading politicians of the
day. Let us be generous. Let us at any rate seem to be generous. Let
us give with an open hand,--but still with a hand which, though open,
shall not bestow too much. The coach must be allowed to run down the
hill. Indeed, unless the coach goes on running no journey will be
made. But let us have the drag on both the hind wheels. And we must
remember that coaches running down hill without drags are apt to come
to serious misfortune.
But there were men, even in the Cabinet, who had other ideas of
public service than that of dragging the wheels of the coach. Mr.
Gresham was in earnest. Plantagenet Palliser was in earnest. That
exceedingly intelligent young nobleman Lord Cantrip was in earnest.
Mr. Mildmay threw, perhaps, as much of earnestness into the matter
as was compatible with his age and his full appreciation of the
manner in which the present cry for Reform had been aroused. He was
thoroughly honest, thoroughly patriotic, and thoroughly ambitious
that he should be written of hereafter as one who to the end of a
long life had worked sedulously for the welfare of the people;--but
he disbelieved in Mr. Turnbull, and in the bottom of his heart
indulged an aristocratic contempt for the penny press. And there was
no man in England more in earnest, more truly desirous of Reform,
than Mr. Monk. It was his great political idea that political
advantages should be extended to the people, whether the people
clamoured for them or did not clamour for them,--even whether they
desired them or did not desire them. "You do not ask a child whether
he would like to learn his lesson," he would say. "At any rate, you
do not wait till he cries for his book." When, therefore, men said to
him that there was no earnestness in the cry for Reform, that the cry
was a false cry, got up for factious purposes by interested persons,
he would reply that the thing to be done should not be done in
obedience to any cry, but because it was demanded by justice, and was
a debt due to the people.
Our hero in the autumn had written to Mr. Monk on the politics of the
moment, and the following had been Mr. Monk's reply:--
Longroyston, October 12, 186--.
MY DEAR FINN,
I am staying here with the Duke and Duchess of St.
Bungay. The house is very full, and Mr. Mildmay was
here last week; but as I don't shoot, and can't play
billiards, and have no taste for charades, I am becoming
tired of the gaieties, and shall leave them to-morrow.
Of course you know that we are not to have the autumn
session. I think that Mr. Mildmay is right. Could we have
been sure of passing our measure, it would have been very
well; but we could not have been sure, and failure with
our bill in a session convened for the express purpose of
passing it would have injured the cause greatly. We could
hardly have gone on with it again in the spring. Indeed,
we must have resigned. And though I may truly say that I
would as lief have a good measure from Lord de Terrier
as from Mr. Mildmay, and that I am indifferent to my own
present personal position, still I think that we should
endeavour to keep our seats as long as we honestly
believe ourselves to be more capable of passing a good
measure than are our opponents.
I am astonished by the difference of opinion which
exists about Reform,--not only as to the difference in
the extent and exact tendency of the measure that is
needed,--but that there should be such a divergence of
ideas as to the grand thing to be done and the grand
reason for doing it. We are all agreed that we want
Reform in order that the House of Commons may be returned
by a larger proportion of the people than is at present
employed upon that work, and that each member when
returned should represent a somewhat more equal section
of the whole constituencies of the country than our
members generally do at present. All men confess that a
£50 county franchise must be too high, and that a borough
with less than two hundred registered voters must be
wrong. But it seems to me that but few among us perceive,
or at any rate acknowledge, the real reasons for changing
these things and reforming what is wrong without delay.
One great authority told us the other day that the sole
object of legislation on this subject should be to get
together the best possible 658 members of Parliament.
That to me would be a most repulsive idea if it were
not that by its very vagueness it becomes inoperative.
Who shall say what is best; or what characteristic
constitutes excellence in a member of Parliament? If
the gentleman means excellence in general wisdom, or
in statecraft, or in skill in talking, or in private
character, or even excellence in patriotism, then I say
that he is utterly wrong, and has never touched with
his intellect the true theory of representation. One
only excellence may be acknowledged, and that is the
excellence of likeness. As a portrait should be like the
person portrayed, so should a representative House be
like the people whom it represents. Nor in arranging
a franchise does it seem to me that we have a right
to regard any other view. If a country be unfit for
representative government,--and it may be that there are
still peoples unable to use properly that greatest of
all blessings,--the question as to what state policy may
be best for them is a different question. But if we do
have representation, let the representative assembly be
like the people, whatever else may be its virtues,--and
whatever else its vices.
Another great authority has told us that our House of
Commons should be the mirror of the people. I say, not
its mirror, but its miniature. And let the artist be
careful to put in every line of the expression of that
ever-moving face. To do this is a great work, and the
artist must know his trade well. In America the work has
been done with so coarse a hand that nothing is shown
in the picture but the broad, plain, unspeaking outline
of the face. As you look from the represented to the
representation you cannot but acknowledge the likeness;
--but there is in that portrait more of the body than of
the mind. The true portrait should represent more than
the body. With us, hitherto, there have been snatches
of the countenance of the nation which have been
inimitable,--a turn of the eye here and a curl of the lip
there, which have seemed to denote a power almost divine.
There have been marvels on the canvas so beautiful that
one approaches the work of remodelling it with awe.
But not only is the picture imperfect,--a thing of
snatches,--but with years it becomes less and still less
like its original.
The necessity for remodelling it is imperative, and we
shall be cowards if we decline the work. But let us be
specially careful to retain as much as possible of those
lines which we all acknowledge to be so faithfully
representative of our nation. To give to a bare numerical
majority of the people that power which the numerical
majority has in the United States, would not be to
achieve representation. The nation as it now exists would
not be known by such a portrait;--but neither can it
now be known by that which exists. It seems to me that
they who are adverse to change, looking back with an
unmeasured respect on what our old Parliaments have done
for us, ignore the majestic growth of the English people,
and forget the present in their worship of the past. They
think that we must be what we were,--at any rate, what
we were thirty years since. They have not, perhaps, gone
into the houses of artisans, or, if there, they have not
looked into the breasts of the men. With population vice
has increased, and these politicians, with ears but
no eyes, hear of drunkenness and sin and ignorance.
And then they declare to themselves that this wicked,
half-barbarous, idle people should be controlled and not
represented. A wicked, half-barbarous, idle people may be
controlled;--but not a people thoughtful, educated, and
industrious. We must look to it that we do not endeavour
to carry our control beyond the wickedness and the
barbarity, and that we be ready to submit to control from
thoughtfulness and industry.
I hope we shall find you helping at the good work early
in the spring.
Yours, always faithfully,
JOSHUA MONK.
Phineas was up in London before the end of January, but did not find
there many of those whom he wished to see. Mr. Low was there, and to
him he showed Mr. Monk's letter, thinking that it must be convincing
even to Mr. Low. This he did in Mrs. Low's drawing-room, knowing that
Mrs. Low would also condescend to discuss politics on an occasion.
He had dined with them, and they had been glad to see him, and Mrs.
Low had been less severe than hitherto against the great sin of her
husband's late pupil. She had condescended to congratulate him on
becoming member for an English borough instead of an Irish one, and
had asked him questions about Saulsby Castle. But, nevertheless, Mr.
Monk's letter was not received with that respectful admiration which
Phineas thought that it deserved. Phineas, foolishly, had read it
out loud, so that the attack came upon him simultaneously from the
husband and from the wife.
"It is just the usual claptrap," said Mr. Low, "only put into
language somewhat more grandiloquent than usual."
"Claptrap!" said Phineas.
"It's what I call downright Radical nonsense," said Mrs. Low, nodding
her head energetically. "Portrait indeed! Why should we want to have
a portrait of ignorance and ugliness? What we all want is to have
things quiet and orderly."
"Then you'd better have a paternal government at once," said Phineas.
"Just so," said Mr. Low,--"only that what you call a paternal
government is not always quiet and orderly. National order I take to
be submission to the law. I should not think it quiet and orderly if
I were sent to Cayenne without being brought before a jury."
"But such a man as you would not be sent to Cayenne," said Phineas,
"My next-door neighbour might be,--which would be almost as bad. Let
him be sent to Cayenne if he deserves it, but let a jury say that
he has deserved it. My idea of government is this,--that we want
to be governed by law and not by caprice, and that we must have a
legislature to make our laws. If I thought that Parliament as at
present established made the laws badly, I would desire a change;
but I doubt whether we shall have them better from any change in
Parliament which Reform will give us."
"Of course not," said Mrs. Low. "But we shall have a lot of beggars
put on horseback, and we all know where they ride to."
Then Phineas became aware that it is not easy to convince any man or
any woman on a point of politics,--not even though he who argues may
have an eloquent letter from a philosophical Cabinet Minister in his
pocket to assist him.
CHAPTER XXXVI
Phineas Finn Makes Progress
February was far advanced and the new Reform Bill had already been
brought forward, before Lady Laura Kennedy came up to town. Phineas
had of course seen Mr. Kennedy and had heard from him tidings of
his wife. She was at Saulsby with Lady Baldock and Miss Boreham and
Violet Effingham, but was to be in London soon. Mr. Kennedy, as it
appeared, did not quite know when he was to expect his wife; and
Phineas thought that he could perceive from the tone of the husband's
voice that something was amiss. He could not however ask any
questions excepting such as referred to the expected arrival. Was
Miss Effingham to come to London with Lady Laura? Mr. Kennedy
believed that Miss Effingham would be up before Easter, but he did
not know whether she would come with his wife. "Women," he said, "are
so fond of mystery that one can never quite know what they intend to
do." He corrected himself at once however, perceiving that he had
seemed to say something against his wife, and explained that his
general accusation against the sex was not intended to apply to
Lady Laura. This, however, he did so awkwardly as to strengthen
the feeling with Phineas that something assuredly was wrong. "Miss
Effingham," said Mr. Kennedy, "never seems to know her own mind."
"I suppose she is like other beautiful girls who are petted on all
sides," said Phineas. "As for her beauty, I don't think much of it,"
said Mr. Kennedy; "and as for petting, I do not understand it in
reference to grown persons. Children may be petted, and dogs,--though
that too is bad; but what you call petting for grown persons is I
think frivolous and almost indecent." Phineas could not help thinking
of Lord Chiltern's opinion that it would have been wise to have left
Mr. Kennedy in the hands of the garrotters.
The debate on the second reading of the bill was to be commenced
on the 1st of March, and two days before that Lady Laura arrived
in Grosvenor Place. Phineas got a note from her in three words to
say that she was at home and would see him if he called on Sunday
afternoon. The Sunday to which she alluded was the last day of
February. Phineas was now more certain than ever that something
was wrong. Had there been nothing wrong between Lady Laura and her
husband, she would not have rebelled against him by asking visitors
to the house on a Sunday. He had nothing to do with that, however,
and of course he did as he was desired. He called on the Sunday, and
found Mrs. Bonteen sitting with Lady Laura. "I am just in time for
the debate," said Lady Laura, when the first greeting was over.
"You don't mean to say that you intend to sit it out," said Mrs.
Bonteen.
"Every word of it,--unless I lose my seat. What else is there to be
done at present?"
"But the place they give us is so unpleasant," said Mrs. Bonteen.
"There are worse places even than the Ladies' Gallery," said
Lady Laura. "And perhaps it is as well to make oneself used to
inconveniences of all kinds. You will speak, Mr. Finn?"
"I intend to do so."
"Of course you will. The great speeches will be Mr. Gresham's, Mr.
Daubeny's, and Mr. Monk's."
"Mr. Palliser intends to be very strong," said Mrs. Bonteen.
"A man cannot be strong or not as he likes it," said Lady Laura. "Mr.
Palliser I believe to be a most useful man, but he never can become
an orator. He is of the same class as Mr. Kennedy,--only of course
higher in the class."
"We all look for a great speech from Mr. Kennedy," said Mrs. Bonteen.
"I have not the slightest idea whether he will open his lips," said
Lady Laura. Immediately after that Mrs. Bonteen took her leave.
"I hate that woman like poison," continued Lady Laura. "She is
always playing a game, and it is such a small game that she plays!
And she contributes so little to society. She is not witty nor
well-informed,--not even sufficiently ignorant or ridiculous to be a
laughing-stock. One gets nothing from her, and yet she has made her
footing good in the world."
"I thought she was a friend of yours."
"You did not think so! You could not have thought so! How can you
bring such an accusation against me, knowing me as you do? But never
mind Mrs. Bonteen now. On what day shall you speak?"
"On Tuesday if I can."
"I suppose you can arrange it?"
"I shall endeavour to do so, as far as any arrangement can go."
"We shall carry the second reading," said Lady Laura.
"Yes," said Phineas; "I think we shall; but by the votes of men who
are determined so to pull the bill to pieces in committee, that its
own parents will not know it. I doubt whether Mr. Mildmay will have
the temper to stand it."
"They tell me that Mr. Mildmay will abandon the custody of the bill
to Mr. Gresham after his first speech."
"I don't know that Mr. Gresham's temper is more enduring than Mr.
Mildmay's," said Phineas.
"Well;--we shall see. My own impression is that nothing would save
the country so effectually at the present moment as the removal of
Mr. Turnbull to a higher and a better sphere."
"Let us say the House of Lords," said Phineas.
"God forbid!" said Lady Laura.
Phineas sat there for half an hour and then got up to go, having
spoken no word on any other subject than that of politics. He longed
to ask after Violet. He longed to make some inquiry respecting Lord
Chiltern. And, to tell the truth, he felt painfully curious to
hear Lady Laura say something about her own self. He could not but
remember what had been said between them up over the waterfall, and
how he had been warned not to return to Loughlinter. And then again,
did Lady Laura know anything of what had passed between him and
Violet? "Where is your brother?" he said, as he rose from his chair.
"Oswald is in London. He was here not an hour before you came in."
"Where is he staying?"
"At Moroni's. He goes down on Tuesday, I think. He is to see his
father to-morrow morning."
"By agreement?"
"Yes;--by agreement. There is a new trouble,--about money that they
think to be due to me. But I cannot tell you all now. There have been
some words between Mr. Kennedy and papa. But I won't talk about it.
You would find Oswald at Moroni's at any hour before eleven
to-morrow."
"Did he say anything about me?" asked Phineas.
"We mentioned your name certainly."
"I do not ask from vanity, but I want to know whether he is angry
with me."
"Angry with you! Not in the least. I'll tell you just what he said.
He said he should not wish to live even with you, but that he would
sooner try it with you than with any man he ever knew."
"He had got a letter from me?"
"He did not say so;--but he did not say he had not."
"I will see him to-morrow if I can." And then Phineas prepared to go.
"One word, Mr. Finn," said Lady Laura, hardly looking him in the face
and yet making an effort to do so. "I wish you to forget what I said
to you at Loughlinter."
"It shall be as though it were forgotten," said Phineas.
"Let it be absolutely forgotten. In such a case a man is bound to do
all that a woman asks him, and no man has a truer spirit of chivalry
than yourself. That is all. Look in when you can. I will not ask you
to dine here as yet, because we are so frightfully dull. Do your best
on Tuesday, and then let us see you on Wednesday. Good-bye."
Phineas as he walked across the park towards his club made up his
mind that he would forget the scene by the waterfall. He had never
quite known what it had meant, and he would wipe it away from his
mind altogether. He acknowledged to himself that chivalry did demand
of him that he should never allow himself to think of Lady Laura's
rash words to him. That she was not happy with her husband was very
clear to him;--but that was altogether another affair. She might be
unhappy with her husband without indulging any guilty love. He had
never thought it possible that she could be happy living with such a
husband as Mr. Kennedy. All that, however, was now past remedy, and
she must simply endure the mode of life which she had prepared for
herself. There were other men and women in London tied together for
better and worse, in reference to whose union their friends knew that
there would be no better;--that it must be all worse. Lady Laura must
bear it, as it was borne by many another married woman.
On the Monday morning Phineas called at Moroni's Hotel at ten
o'clock, but in spite of Lady Laura's assurance to the contrary, he
found that Lord Chiltern was out. He had felt some palpitation at the
heart as he made his inquiry, knowing well the fiery nature of the
man he expected to see. It might be that there would be some actual
personal conflict between him and this half-mad lord before he got
back again into the street. What Lady Laura had said about her
brother did not in the estimation of Phineas make this at all the
less probable. The half-mad lord was so singular in his ways that it
might well be that he should speak handsomely of a rival behind his
back and yet take him by the throat as soon as they were together,
face to face. And yet, as Phineas thought, it was necessary that he
should see the half-mad lord. He had written a letter to which he had
received no reply, and he considered it to be incumbent on him to
ask whether it had been received and whether any answer to it was
intended to be given. He went therefore to Lord Chiltern at once,--as
I have said, with some feeling at his heart that there might be
violence, at any rate of words, before he should find himself again
in the street. But Lord Chiltern was not there. All that the porter
knew was that Lord Chiltern intended to leave the house on the
following morning. Then Phineas wrote a note and left it with the
porter.
DEAR CHILTERN,
I particularly want to see you with reference to a letter
I wrote to you last summer. I must be in the House to-day
from four till the debate is over. I will be at the Reform
Club from two till half-past three, and will come if you
will send for me, or I will meet you anywhere at any hour
to-morrow morning.
Yours, always, P. F.
No message came to him at the Reform Club, and he was in his seat in
the House by four o'clock. During the debate a note was brought to
him, which ran as follows:--
I have got your letter this moment. Of course we must
meet. I hunt on Tuesday, and go down by the early train;
but I will come to town on Wednesday. We shall require to
be private, and I will therefore be at your rooms at one
o'clock on that day.--C.
Phineas at once perceived that the note was a hostile note, written
in an angry spirit,--written to one whom the writer did not at the
moment acknowledge to be his friend. This was certainly the case,
whatever Lord Chiltern may have said to his sister as to his
friendship for Phineas. Phineas crushed the note into his pocket, and
of course determined that he would be in his rooms at the hour named.
The debate was opened by a speech from Mr. Mildmay, in which that
gentleman at great length and with much perspicuity explained his
notion of that measure of Parliamentary Reform which he thought to
be necessary. He was listened to with the greatest attention to the
close,--and perhaps, at the end of his speech, with more attention
than usual, as there had gone abroad a rumour that the Prime Minister
intended to declare that this would be the last effort of his life
in that course. But, if he ever intended to utter such a pledge, his
heart misgave him when the time came for uttering it. He merely said
that as the management of the bill in committee would be an affair
of much labour, and probably spread over many nights, he would be
assisted in his work by his colleagues, and especially by his right
honourable friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. It was
then understood that Mr. Gresham would take the lead should the bill
go into committee;--but it was understood also that no resignation of
leadership had been made by Mr. Mildmay.
The measure now proposed to the House was very much the same as that
which had been brought forward in the last session. The existing
theory of British representation was not to be changed, but the
actual practice was to be brought nearer to the ideal theory. The
ideas of manhood suffrage, and of electoral districts, were to be as
for ever removed from the bulwarks of the British Constitution. There
were to be counties with agricultural constituencies, purposely
arranged to be purely agricultural, whenever the nature of the
counties would admit of its being so. No artificer at Reform, let
him be Conservative or Liberal, can make Middlesex or Lancashire
agricultural; but Wiltshire and Suffolk were to be preserved
inviolable to the plough,--and the apples of Devonshire were still
to have their sway. Every town in the three kingdoms with a certain
population was to have two members. But here there was much room
for cavil,--as all men knew would be the case. Who shall say what
is a town, or where shall be its limits? Bits of counties might be
borrowed, so as to lessen the Conservatism of the county without
endangering the Liberalism of the borough. And then there were the
boroughs with one member,--and then the groups of little boroughs.
In the discussion of any such arrangement how easy is the picking
of holes; how impossible the fabrication of a garment that shall be
impervious to such picking! Then again there was that great question
of the ballot. On that there was to be no mistake. Mr. Mildmay again
pledged himself to disappear from the Treasury bench should any
motion, clause, or resolution be carried by that House in favour of
the ballot. He spoke for three hours, and then left the carcass of
his bill to be fought for by the opposing armies.
No reader of these pages will desire that the speeches in the debate
should be even indicated. It soon became known that the Conservatives
would not divide the House against the second reading of the bill.
They declared, however, very plainly their intention of so altering
the clauses of the bill in committee,--or at least of attempting so
to do,--as to make the bill their bill, rather than the bill of their
opponents. To this Mr. Palliser replied that as long as nothing vital
was touched, the Government would only be too happy to oblige their
friends opposite. If anything vital were touched, the Government
could only fall back upon their friends on that side. And in this way
men were very civil to each other. But Mr. Turnbull, who opened the
debate on the Tuesday, thundered out an assurance to gods and men
that he would divide the House on the second reading of the bill
itself. He did not doubt but that there were many good men and true
to go with him into the lobby, but into the lobby he would go if he
had no more than a single friend to support him. And he warned the
Sovereign, and he warned the House, and he warned the people of
England, that the measure of Reform now proposed by a so-called
liberal Minister was a measure prepared in concert with the ancient
enemies of the people. He was very loud, very angry, and quite
successful in hallooing down sundry attempts which were made to
interrupt him. "I find," he said, "that there are many members here
who do not know me yet,--young members, probably, who are green from
the waste lands and road-sides of private life. They will know me
soon, and then, may be, there will be less of this foolish noise,
less of this elongation of unnecessary necks. Our Rome must be
aroused to a sense of its danger by other voices than these." He
was called to order, but it was ruled that he had not been out of
order,--and he was very triumphant. Mr. Monk answered him, and it
was declared afterwards that Mr. Monk's speech was one of the finest
pieces of oratory that had ever been uttered in that House. He made
one remark personal to Mr. Turnbull. "I quite agreed with the right
honourable gentleman in the chair," he said, "when he declared that
the honourable member was not out of order just now. We all of us
agree with him always on such points. The rules of our House have
been laid down with the utmost latitude, so that the course of our
debates may not be frivolously or too easily interrupted. But a
member may be so in order as to incur the displeasure of the House,
and to merit the reproaches of his countrymen." This little duel
gave great life to the debate; but it was said that those two great
Reformers, Mr. Turnbull and Mr. Monk, could never again meet as
friends.
In the course of the debate on Tuesday, Phineas got upon his legs.
The reader, I trust, will remember that hitherto he had failed
altogether as a speaker. On one occasion he had lacked even the
spirit to use and deliver an oration which he had prepared. On
a second occasion he had broken down,--woefully, and past all
redemption, as said those who were not his friends,--unfortunately,
but not past redemption, as said those who were his true friends.
After that once again he had arisen and said a few words which had
called for no remark, and had been spoken as though he were in the
habit of addressing the House daily. It may be doubted whether there
were half-a-dozen men now present who recognised the fact that this
man, who was so well known to so many of them, was now about to
make another attempt at a first speech. Phineas himself diligently
attempted to forget that such was the case. He had prepared for
himself a few headings of what he intended to say, and on one or
two points had arranged his words. His hope was that even though
he should forget the words, he might still be able to cling to the
thread of his discourse. When he found himself again upon his legs
amidst those crowded seats, for a few moments there came upon him
that old sensation of awe. Again things grew dim before his eyes, and
again he hardly knew at which end of that long chamber the Speaker
was sitting. But there arose within him a sudden courage, as soon as
the sound of his own voice in that room had made itself intimate to
his ear; and after the first few sentences, all fear, all awe, was
gone from him. When he read his speech in the report afterwards, he
found that he had strayed very wide of his intended course, but he
had strayed without tumbling into ditches, or falling into sunken
pits. He had spoken much from Mr. Monk's letter, but had had the
grace to acknowledge whence had come his inspiration. He hardly knew,
however, whether he had failed again or not, till Barrington Erle
came up to him as they were leaving the House, with his old easy
pressing manner. "So you have got into form at last," he said. "I
always thought that it would come. I never for a moment believed
but that it would come sooner or later." Phineas Finn answered
not a word; but he went home and lay awake all night triumphant.
The verdict of Barrington Erle sufficed to assure him that he had
succeeded.
CHAPTER XXXVII
A Rough Encounter
Phineas, when he woke, had two matters to occupy his mind,--his
success of the previous night, and his coming interview with Lord
Chiltern. He stayed at home the whole morning, knowing that nothing
could be done before the hour Lord Chiltern had named for his visit.
He read every word of the debate, studiously postponing the perusal
of his own speech till he should come to it in due order. And then he
wrote to his father, commencing his letter as though his writing had
no reference to the affairs of the previous night. But he soon found
himself compelled to break into some mention of it. "I send you a
_Times_," he said, "in order that you may see that I have had my
finger in the pie. I have hitherto abstained from putting myself
forward in the House, partly through a base fear for which I despise
myself, and partly through a feeling of prudence that a man of my age
should not be in a hurry to gather laurels. This is literally true.
There has been the fear, and there has been the prudence. My wonder
is, that I have not incurred more contempt from others because I have
been a coward. People have been so kind to me that I must suppose
them to have judged me more leniently than I have judged myself."
Then, as he was putting up the paper, he looked again at his own
speech, and of course read every word of it once more. As he did so
it occurred to him that the reporters had been more than courteous to
him. The man who had followed him had been, he thought, at any rate
as long-winded as himself; but to this orator less than half a column
had been granted. To him had been granted ten lines in big type, and
after that a whole column and a half. Let Lord Chiltern come and do
his worst!
When it wanted but twenty minutes to one, and he was beginning to
think in what way he had better answer the half-mad lord, should the
lord in his wrath be very mad, there came to him a note by the hand
of some messenger. He knew at once that it was from Lady Laura, and
opened it in hot haste It was as follows:--
DEAR MR. FINN,
We are all talking about your speech. My father was in
the gallery and heard it,--and said that he had to thank
me for sending you to Loughton. That made me very happy.
Mr. Kennedy declares that you were eloquent, but too
short. That coming from him is praise indeed. I have seen
Barrington, who takes pride to himself that you are his
political child. Violet says that it is the only speech
she ever read. I was there, and was delighted. I was sure
that it was in you to do it.
Yours, L. K.
I suppose we shall see you after the House is up, but
I write this as I shall barely have an opportunity of
speaking to you then. I shall be in Portman Square, not
at home, from six till seven.
The moment in which Phineas refolded this note and put it into his
breast coat-pocket was, I think, the happiest of his life. Then,
before he had withdrawn his hand from his breast, he remembered that
what was now about to take place between him and Lord Chiltern would
probably be the means of separating him altogether from Lady Laura
and her family. Nay, might it not render it necessary that he should
abandon the seat in Parliament which had been conferred upon him by
the personal kindness of Lord Brentford? Let that be as it might. One
thing was clear to him. He would not abandon Violet Effingham till
he should be desired to do so in the plainest language by Violet
Effingham herself. Looking at his watch he saw that it was one
o'clock, and at that moment Lord Chiltern was announced.
Phineas went forward immediately with his hand out to meet his
visitor. "Chiltern," he said, "I am very glad to see you." But Lord
Chiltern did not take his hand. Passing on to the table, with his hat
still on his head, and with a dark scowl upon his brow, the young
lord stood for a few moments perfectly silent. Then he chucked a
letter across the table to the spot at which Phineas was standing.
Phineas, taking up the letter, perceived that it was that which
he, in his great attempt to be honest, had written from the inn at
Loughton. "It is my own letter to you," he said.
"Yes; it is your letter to me. I received it oddly enough together
with your own note at Moroni's,--on Monday morning. It has been
round the world, I suppose, and reached me only then. You must
withdraw it."
"Withdraw it?"
"Yes, sir, withdraw it. As far as I can learn, without asking any
question which would have committed myself or the young lady, you
have not acted upon it. You have not yet done what you there threaten
to do. In that you have been very wise, and there can be no
difficulty in your withdrawing the letter."
"I certainly shall not withdraw it, Lord Chiltern."
"Do you remember--what--I once--told you,--about myself and Miss
Effingham?" This question he asked very slowly, pausing between the
words, and looking full into the face of his rival, towards whom he
had gradually come nearer. And his countenance, as he did so, was
by no means pleasant. The redness of his complexion had become more
ruddy than usual; he still wore his hat as though with studied
insolence; his right hand was clenched; and there was that look of
angry purpose in his eye which no man likes to see in the eye of an
antagonist. Phineas was afraid of no violence, personal to himself;
but he was afraid of,--of what I may, perhaps, best call "a row."
To be tumbling over the chairs and tables with his late friend and
present enemy in Mrs. Bunce's room would be most unpleasant to him.
If there were to be blows he, too, must strike;--and he was very
averse to strike Lady Laura's brother, Lord Brentford's son, Violet
Effingham's friend. If need be, however, he would strike.
"I suppose I remember what you mean," said Phineas. "I think you
declared that you would quarrel with any man who might presume to
address Miss Effingham. Is it that to which you allude?"
"It is that," said Lord Chiltern.
"I remember what you said very well. If nothing else was to deter me
from asking Miss Effingham to be my wife, you will hardly think that
that ought to have any weight. The threat had no weight."
"It was not spoken as a threat, sir, and that you know as well as I
do. It was said from a friend to a friend,--as I thought then. But it
is not the less true. I wonder what you can think of faith and truth
and honesty of purpose when you took advantage of my absence,--you,
whom I had told a thousand times that I loved her better than my own
soul! You stand before the world as a rising man, and I stand before
the world as a man--damned. You have been chosen by my father to sit
for our family borough, while I am an outcast from his house. You
have Cabinet Ministers for your friends, while I have hardly a decent
associate left to me in the world. But I can say of myself that I
have never done anything unworthy of a gentleman, while this thing
that you are doing is unworthy of the lowest man."
"I have done nothing unworthy," said Phineas. "I wrote to you
instantly when I had resolved,--though it was painful to me to have
to tell such a secret to any one."
"You wrote! Yes; when I was miles distant; weeks, months away. But I
did not come here to bullyrag like an old woman. I got your letter
only on Monday, and know nothing of what has occurred. Is Miss
Effingham to be--your wife?" Lord Chiltern had now come quite close
to Phineas, and Phineas felt that that clenched fist might be in his
face in half a moment. Miss Effingham of course was not engaged to
him, but it seemed to him that if he were now so to declare, such
declaration would appear to have been drawn from him by fear. "I ask
you," said Lord Chiltern, "in what position you now stand towards
Miss Effingham. If you are not a coward you will tell me."
"Whether I tell you or not, you know that I am not a coward," said
Phineas.
"I shall have to try," said Lord Chiltern. "But if you please I will
ask you for an answer to my question."
Phineas paused for a moment, thinking what honesty of purpose and
a high spirit would, when combined together, demand of him, and
together with these requirements he felt that he was bound to join
some feeling of duty towards Miss Effingham. Lord Chiltern was
standing there, fiery red, with his hand still clenched, and his hat
still on, waiting for his answer. "Let me have your question again,"
said Phineas, "and I will answer it if I find that I can do so
without loss of self-respect."
"I ask you in what position you stand towards Miss Effingham. Mind,
I do not doubt at all, but I choose to have a reply from yourself."
"You will remember, of course, that I can only answer to the best of
my belief."
"Answer to the best of your belief."
"I think she regards me as an intimate friend."
"Had you said as an indifferent acquaintance, you would, I think,
have been nearer the mark. But we will let that be. I presume I
may understand that you have given up any idea of changing that
position?"
"You may understand nothing of the kind, Lord Chiltern."
"Why;--what hope have you?"
"That is another thing. I shall not speak of that;--at any rate not
to you."
"Then, sir,--" and now Lord Chiltern advanced another step and raised
his hand as though he were about to put it with some form of violence
on the person of his rival.
"Stop, Chiltern," said Phineas, stepping back, so that there was some
article of furniture between him and his adversary. "I do not choose
that there should be a riot here."
"What do you call a riot, sir? I believe that after all you are a
poltroon. What I require of you is that you shall meet me. Will you
do that?"
"You mean,--to fight?"
"Yes,--to fight; to fight; to fight. For what other purpose do you
suppose that I can wish to meet you?" Phineas felt at the moment that
the fighting of a duel would be destructive to all his political
hopes. Few Englishmen fight duels in these days. They who do so
are always reckoned to be fools. And a duel between him and Lord
Brentford's son must, as he thought, separate him from Violet, from
Lady Laura, from Lord Brentford, and from his borough. But yet how
could he refuse? "What have you to think of, sir, when such an offer
as that is made to you?" said the fiery-red lord.
"I have to think whether I have courage enough to refuse to make
myself an ass."
"You say that you do not wish to have a riot. That is your way to
escape what you call--a riot."
"You want to bully me, Chiltern."
"No, sir;--I simply want this, that you should leave me where you
found me, and not interfere with that which you have long known I
claim as my own."
"But it is not your own."
"Then you can only fight me."
"You had better send some friend to me, and I will name some one,
whom he shall meet."
"Of course I will do that if I have your promise to meet me. We
can be in Belgium in an hour or two, and back again in a few more
hours;--that is, any one of us who may chance to be alive.
"I will select a friend, and will tell him everything, and will then
do as he bids me."
"Yes;--some old steady-going buffer. Mr. Kennedy, perhaps."
"It will certainly not be Mr. Kennedy. I shall probably ask Laurence
Fitzgibbon to manage for me in such an affair."
"Perhaps you will see him at once, then, so that Colepepper may
arrange with him this afternoon. And let me assure you, Mr. Finn,
that there will be a meeting between us after some fashion, let the
ideas of your friend Mr. Fitzgibbon be what they may." Then Lord
Chiltern purposed to go, but turned again as he was going. "And
remember this," he said, "my complaint is that you have been false to
me,--damnably false; not that you have fallen in love with this young
lady or with that." Then the fiery-red lord opened the door for
himself and took his departure.
Phineas, as soon as he was alone, walked down to the House, at which
there was an early sitting. As he went there was one great question
which he had to settle with himself,--Was there any justice in the
charge made against him that he had been false to his friend? When he
had thought over the matter at Saulsby, after rushing down there that
he might throw himself at Violet's feet, he had assured himself that
such a letter as that which he resolved to write to Lord Chiltern,
would be even chivalrous in its absolute honesty. He would tell his
purpose to Lord Chiltern the moment that his purpose was formed;--and
would afterwards speak of Lord Chiltern behind his back as one
dear friend should speak of another. Had Miss Effingham shown the
slightest intention of accepting Lord Chiltern's offer, he would have
acknowledged to himself that the circumstances of his position made
it impossible that he should, with honour, become his friend's rival.
But was he to be debarred for ever from getting that which he wanted
because Lord Chiltern wanted it also,--knowing, as he did so well,
that Lord Chiltern could not get the thing which he wanted? All this
had been quite sufficient for him at Saulsby. But now the charge
against him that he had been false to his friend rang in his ears and
made him unhappy. It certainly was true that Lord Chiltern had not
given up his hopes, and that he had spoken probably more openly to
Phineas respecting them than he had done to any other human being. If
it was true that he had been false, then he must comply with any
requisition which Lord Chiltern might make,--short of voluntarily
giving up the lady. He must fight if he were asked to do so, even
though fighting were his ruin.
When again in the House yesterday's scene came back upon him, and
more than one man came to him congratulating him. Mr. Monk took his
hand and spoke a word to him. The old Premier nodded to him. Mr.
Gresham greeted him; and Plantagenet Palliser openly told him that
he had made a good speech. How sweet would all this have been had
there not been ever at his heart the remembrance of his terrible
difficulty,--the consciousness that he was about to be forced into
an absurdity which would put an end to all this sweetness! Why was
the world in England so severe against duelling? After all, as he
regarded the matter now, a duel might be the best way, nay, the only
way out of a difficulty. If he might only be allowed to go out with
Lord Chiltern the whole thing might be arranged. If he were not shot
he might carry on his suit with Miss Effingham unfettered by any
impediment on that side. And if he were shot, what matter was that
to any one but himself? Why should the world be so thin-skinned,--so
foolishly chary of human life?
Laurence Fitzgibbon did not come to the House, and Phineas looked for
him at both the clubs which he frequented,--leaving a note at each as
he did not find him. He also left a note for him at his lodgings in
Duke Street. "I must see you this evening. I shall dine at the Reform
Club,--pray come there." After that, Phineas went up to Portman
Square, in accordance with the instructions received from Lady Laura.
There he saw Violet Effingham, meeting her for the first time since
he had parted from her on the great steps at Saulsby. Of course
he spoke to her, and of course she was gracious to him. But her
graciousness was only a smile and his speech was only a word. There
were many in the room, but not enough to make privacy possible,--as
it becomes possible at a crowded evening meeting. Lord Brentford
was there, and the Bonteens, and Barrington Erle, and Lady Glencora
Palliser, and Lord Cantrip with his young wife. It was manifestly a
meeting of Liberals, semi-social and semi-political;--so arranged
that ladies might feel that some interest in politics was allowed
to them, and perhaps some influence also. Afterwards Mr. Palliser
himself came in. Phineas, however, was most struck by finding that
Laurence Fitzgibbon was there, and that Mr. Kennedy was not. In
regard to Mr. Kennedy, he was quite sure that had such a meeting
taken place before Lady Laura's marriage, Mr. Kennedy would have
been present. "I must speak to you as we go away," said Phineas,
whispering a word into Fitzgibbon's ear. "I have been leaving notes
for you all about the town." "Not a duel, I hope," said Fitzgibbon.
How pleasant it was,--that meeting; or would have been had there not
been that nightmare on his breast! They all talked as though there
were perfect accord between them and perfect confidence. There were
there great men,--Cabinet Ministers, and beautiful women,--the wives
and daughters of some of England's highest nobles. And Phineas Finn,
throwing back, now and again, a thought to Killaloe, found himself
among them as one of themselves. How could any Mr. Low say that he
was wrong?
On a sofa near to him, so that he could almost touch her foot with
his, was sitting Violet Effingham, and as he leaned over from his
chair discussing some point in Mr. Mildmay's bill with that most
inveterate politician, Lady Glencora, Violet looked into his face and
smiled. Oh heavens! If Lord Chiltern and he might only toss up as to
which of them should go to Patagonia and remain there for the next
ten years, and which should have Violet Effingham for a wife in
London!
"Come along, Phineas, if you mean to come," said Laurence Fitzgibbon.
Phineas was of course bound to go, though Lady Glencora was still
talking Radicalism, and Violet Effingham was still smiling ineffably.
VOLUME II
CHAPTER XXXVIII
The Duel
"I knew it was a duel;--bedad I did," said Laurence Fitzgibbon,
standing at the corner of Orchard Street and Oxford Street, when
Phineas had half told his story. "I was sure of it from the tone of
your voice, my boy. We mustn't let it come off, that's all;--not
if we can help it." Then Phineas was allowed to proceed and finish
his story. "I don't see any way out of it; I don't, indeed," said
Laurence. By this time Phineas had come to think that the duel was in
very truth the best way out of the difficulty. It was a bad way out,
but then it was a way;--and he could not see any other. "As for ill
treating him, that's nonsense," said Laurence. "What are the girls to
do, if one fellow mayn't come on as soon as another fellow is down?
But then, you see, a fellow never knows when he's down himself, and
therefore he thinks that he's ill used. I'll tell you what now. I
shouldn't wonder if we couldn't do it on the sly,--unless one of you
is stupid enough to hit the other in an awkward place. If you are
certain of your hand now, the right shoulder is the best spot."
Phineas felt very certain that he would not hit Lord Chiltern in an
awkward place, although he was by no means sure of his hand. Let come
what might, he would not aim at his adversary. But of this he had
thought it proper to say nothing to Laurence Fitzgibbon.
And the duel did come off on the sly. The meeting in the drawing-room
in Portman Square, of which mention was made in the last chapter,
took place on a Wednesday afternoon. On the Thursday, Friday, Monday,
and Tuesday following, the great debate on Mr. Mildmay's bill was
continued, and at three on the Tuesday night the House divided. There
was a majority in favour of the Ministers, not large enough to permit
them to claim a triumph for their party, or even an ovation for
themselves; but still sufficient to enable them to send their bill
into committee. Mr. Daubeny and Mr. Turnbull had again joined
their forces together in opposition to the ministerial measure. On
the Thursday Phineas had shown himself in the House, but during
the remainder of this interesting period he was absent from his
place, nor was he seen at the clubs, nor did any man know of his
whereabouts. I think that Lady Laura Kennedy was the first to miss
him with any real sense of his absence. She would now go to Portman
Square on the afternoon of every Sunday,--at which time her husband
was attending the second service of his church,--and there she would
receive those whom she called her father's guests. But as her father
was never there on the Sundays, and as these gatherings had been
created by herself, the reader will probably think that she was
obeying her husband's behests in regard to the Sabbath after a very
indifferent fashion. The reader may be quite sure, however, that Mr.
Kennedy knew well what was being done in Portman Square. Whatever
might be Lady Laura's faults, she did not commit the fault of
disobeying her husband in secret. There were, probably, a few words
on the subject; but we need not go very closely into that matter at
the present moment.
On the Sunday which afforded some rest in the middle of the great
Reform debate Lady Laura asked for Mr. Finn, and no one could answer
her question. And then it was remembered that Laurence Fitzgibbon
was also absent. Barrington Erle knew nothing of Phineas,--had heard
nothing; but was able to say that Fitzgibbon had been with Mr.
Ratler, the patronage secretary and liberal whip, early on Thursday,
expressing his intention of absenting himself for two days. Mr.
Ratler had been wroth, bidding him remain at his duty, and pointing
out to him the great importance of the moment. Then Barrington Erle
quoted Laurence Fitzgibbon's reply. "My boy," said Laurence to poor
Ratler, "the path of duty leads but to the grave. All the same; I'll
be in at the death, Ratler, my boy, as sure as the sun's in heaven."
Not ten minutes after the telling of this little story, Fitzgibbon
entered the room in Portman Square, and Lady Laura at once asked him
after Phineas. "Bedad, Lady Laura, I have been out of town myself for
two days, and I know nothing."
"Mr. Finn has not been with you, then?"
"With me! No,--not with me. I had a job of business of my own which
took me over to Paris. And has Phinny fled too? Poor Ratler! I
shouldn't wonder if it isn't an asylum he's in before the session is
over."
Laurence Fitzgibbon certainly possessed the rare accomplishment of
telling a lie with a good grace. Had any man called him a liar he
would have considered himself to be not only insulted, but injured
also. He believed himself to be a man of truth. There were, however,
in his estimation certain subjects on which a man might depart as
wide as the poles are asunder from truth without subjecting himself
to any ignominy for falsehood. In dealing with a tradesman as to his
debts, or with a rival as to a lady, or with any man or woman in
defence of a lady's character, or in any such matter as that of a
duel, Laurence believed that a gentleman was bound to lie, and that
he would be no gentleman if he hesitated to do so. Not the slightest
prick of conscience disturbed him when he told Lady Laura that he
had been in Paris, and that he knew nothing of Phineas Finn. But, in
truth, during the last day or two he had been in Flanders, and not in
Paris, and had stood as second with his friend Phineas on the sands
at Blankenberg, a little fishing-town some twelve miles distant
from Bruges, and had left his friend since that at an hotel at
Ostend,--with a wound just under the shoulder, from which a bullet
had been extracted.
The manner of the meeting had been in this wise. Captain Colepepper
and Laurence Fitzgibbon had held their meeting, and at this meeting
Laurence had taken certain standing-ground on behalf of his friend,
and in obedience to his friend's positive instruction;--which was
this, that his friend could not abandon his right of addressing the
young lady, should he hereafter ever think fit to do so. Let that
be granted, and Laurence would do anything. But then that could not
be granted, and Laurence could only shrug his shoulders. Nor would
Laurence admit that his friend had been false. "The question lies in
a nutshell," said Laurence, with that sweet Connaught brogue which
always came to him when he desired to be effective;--"here it is. One
gentleman tells another that he's sweet upon a young lady, but that
the young lady has refused him, and always will refuse him, for ever
and ever. That's the truth anyhow. Is the second gentleman bound by
that not to address the young lady? I say he is not bound. It'd be a
d----d hard tratement, Captain Colepepper, if a man's mouth and all
the ardent affections of his heart were to be stopped in that manner!
By Jases, I don't know who'd like to be the friend of any man if
that's to be the way of it."
Captain Colepepper was not very good at an argument. "I think they'd
better see each other," said Colepepper, pulling his thick grey
moustache.
"If you choose to have it so, so be it. But I think it the hardest
thing in the world;--I do indeed." Then they put their heads together
in the most friendly way, and declared that the affair should, if
possible, be kept private.
On the Thursday night Lord Chiltern and Captain Colepepper went over
by Calais and Lille to Bruges. Laurence Fitzgibbon, with his friend
Dr. O'Shaughnessy, crossed by the direct boat from Dover to Ostend.
Phineas went to Ostend by Dover and Calais, but he took the day
route on Friday. It had all been arranged among them, so that there
might be no suspicion as to the job in hand. Even O'Shaughnessy and
Laurence Fitzgibbon had left London by separate trains. They met on
the sands at Blankenberg about nine o'clock on the Saturday morning,
having reached that village in different vehicles from Ostend and
Bruges, and had met quite unobserved amidst the sand-heaps. But one
shot had been exchanged, and Phineas had been wounded in the right
shoulder. He had proposed to exchange another shot with his left
hand, declaring his capability of shooting quite as well with the
left as with the right; but to this both Colepepper and Fitzgibbon
had objected. Lord Chiltern had offered to shake hands with his late
friend in a true spirit of friendship, if only his late friend would
say that he did not intend to prosecute his suit with the young lady.
In all these disputes the young lady's name was never mentioned.
Phineas indeed had not once named Violet to Fitzgibbon, speaking of
her always as the lady in question; and though Laurence correctly
surmised the identity of the young lady, he never hinted that he had
even guessed her name. I doubt whether Lord Chiltern had been so wary
when alone with Captain Colepepper; but then Lord Chiltern was, when
he spoke at all, a very plain-spoken man. Of course his lordship's
late friend Phineas would give no such pledge, and therefore Lord
Chiltern moved off the ground and back to Blankenberg and Bruges, and
into Brussels, in still living enmity with our hero. Laurence and the
doctor took Phineas back to Ostend, and though the bullet was then in
his shoulder, Phineas made his way through Blankenberg after such a
fashion that no one there knew what had occurred. Not a living soul,
except the five concerned, was at that time aware that a duel had
been fought among the sand-hills.
Laurence Fitzgibbon made his way to Dover by the Saturday night's
boat, and was able to show himself in Portman Square on the Sunday.
"Know anything about Phinny Finn?" he said afterwards to Barrington
Erle, in answer to an inquiry from that anxious gentleman. "Not
a word! I think you'd better send the town-crier round after
him." Barrington, however, did not feel quite so well assured of
Fitzgibbon's truth as Lady Laura had done.
Dr. O'Shaughnessy remained during the Sunday and Monday at Ostend
with his patient, and the people at the inn only knew that Mr. Finn
had sprained his shoulder badly; and on the Tuesday they came back
to London again, via Calais and Dover. No bone had been broken, and
Phineas, though his shoulder was very painful, bore the journey well.
O'Shaughnessy had received a telegram on the Monday, telling him that
the division would certainly take place on the Tuesday,--and on the
Tuesday, at about ten in the evening, Phineas went down to the House.
"By ----, you're here," said Ratler, taking hold of him with an
affection that was too warm. "Yes; I'm here," said Phineas, wincing
in agony; "but be a little careful, there's a good fellow. I've been
down in Kent and put my arm out."
"Put your arm out, have you?" said Ratler, observing the sling for
the first time. "I'm sorry for that. But you'll stop and vote?"
"Yes;--I'll stop and vote. I've come up for the purpose. But I hope
it won't be very late."
"There are both Daubeny and Gresham to speak yet, and at least three
others. I don't suppose it will be much before three. But you're
all right now. You can go down and smoke if you like!" In this way
Phineas Finn spoke in the debate, and heard the end of it, voting for
his party, and fought his duel with Lord Chiltern in the middle of
it.
He did go and sit on a well-cushioned bench in the smoking-room, and
then was interrogated by many of his friends as to his mysterious
absence. He had, he said, been down in Kent, and had had an accident
with his arm, by which he had been confined. When this questioner and
that perceived that there was some little mystery in the matter, the
questioners did not push their questions, but simply entertained
their own surmises. One indiscreet questioner, however, did trouble
Phineas sorely, declaring that there must have been some affair in
which a woman had had a part, and asking after the young lady of
Kent. This indiscreet questioner was Laurence Fitzgibbon, who, as
Phineas thought, carried his spirit of intrigue a little too far.
Phineas stayed and voted, and then he went painfully home to his
lodgings.
How singular would it be if this affair of the duel should pass away,
and no one be a bit the wiser but those four men who had been with
him on the sands at Blankenberg! Again he wondered at his own luck.
He had told himself that a duel with Lord Chiltern must create
a quarrel between him and Lord Chiltern's relations, and also
between him and Violet Effingham; that it must banish him from
his comfortable seat for Loughton, and ruin him in regard to his
political prospects. And now he had fought his duel, and was back in
town,--and the thing seemed to have been a thing of nothing. He had
not as yet seen Lady Laura or Violet, but he had no doubt but they
both were as much in the dark as other people. The day might arrive,
he thought, on which it would be pleasant for him to tell Violet
Effingham what had occurred, but that day had not come as yet.
Whither Lord Chiltern had gone, or what Lord Chiltern intended to
do, he had not any idea; but he imagined that he should soon hear
something of her brother from Lady Laura. That Lord Chiltern should
say a word to Lady Laura of what had occurred,--or to any other
person in the world,--he did not in the least suspect. There could
be no man more likely to be reticent in such matters than Lord
Chiltern,--or more sure to be guided by an almost exaggerated sense
of what honour required of him. Nor did he doubt the discretion of
his friend Fitzgibbon;--if only his friend might not damage the
secret by being too discreet. Of the silence of the doctor and the
captain he was by no means equally sure; but even though they should
gossip, the gossiping would take so long a time in oozing out and
becoming recognised information, as to have lost much of its power
for injuring him. Were Lady Laura to hear at this moment that he
had been over to Belgium, and had fought a duel with Lord Chiltern
respecting Violet, she would probably feel herself obliged to quarrel
with him; but no such obligation would rest on her, if in the course
of six or nine months she should gradually have become aware that
such an encounter had taken place.
Lord Chiltern, during their interview at the rooms in Great
Marlborough Street, had said a word to him about the seat in
Parliament;--had expressed some opinion that as he, Phineas Finn, was
interfering with the views of the Standish family in regard to Miss
Effingham, he ought not to keep the Standish seat, which had been
conferred upon him in ignorance of any such intended interference.
Phineas, as he thought of this, could not remember Lord Chiltern's
words, but there was present to him an idea that such had been their
purport. Was he bound, in circumstances as they now existed, to give
up Loughton? He made up his mind that he was not so bound unless
Lord Chiltern should demand from him that he should do so; but,
nevertheless, he was uneasy in his position. It was quite true that
the seat now was his for this session by all parliamentary law, even
though the electors themselves might wish to be rid of him, and that
Lord Brentford could not even open his mouth upon the matter in a
tone more loud than that of a whisper. But Phineas, feeling that
he had consented to accept the favour of a corrupt seat from Lord
Brentford, felt also that he was bound to give up the spoil if it
were demanded from him. If it were demanded from him, either by the
father or the son, it should be given up at once.
On the following morning he found a leading article in the _People's
Banner_ devoted solely to himself. "During the late debate,"--so ran
a passage in the leading article,--"Mr. Finn, Lord Brentford's Irish
nominee for his pocket-borough at Loughton, did at last manage to
stand on his legs and open his mouth. If we are not mistaken, this
is Mr. Finn's third session in Parliament, and hitherto he has been
unable to articulate three sentences, though he has on more than one
occasion made the attempt. For what special merit this young man has
been selected for aristocratic patronage we do not know,--but that
there must be some merit recognisable by aristocratic eyes, we
surmise. Three years ago he was a raw young Irishman, living in
London as Irishmen only know how to live, earning nothing, and
apparently without means; and then suddenly he bursts out as a member
of Parliament and as the friend of Cabinet Ministers. The possession
of one good gift must be acceded to the honourable member for
Loughton,--he is a handsome young man, and looks to be as strong as
a coal-porter. Can it be that his promotion has sprung from this? Be
this as it may, we should like to know where he has been during his
late mysterious absence from Parliament, and in what way he came by
the wound in his arm. Even handsome young members of Parliament,
fêted by titled ladies and their rich lords, are amenable to the
laws,--to the laws of this country, and to the laws of any other
which it may suit them to visit for a while!"
"Infamous scoundrel!" said Phineas to himself, as he read this.
"Vile, low, disreputable blackguard!" It was clear enough, however,
that Quintus Slide had found out something of his secret. If so, his
only hope would rest on the fact that his friends were not likely to
see the columns of the _People's Banner_.
CHAPTER XXXIX
Lady Laura Is Told
By the time that Mr. Mildmay's great bill was going into committee
Phineas was able to move about London in comfort,--with his arm,
however, still in a sling. There had been nothing more about him and
his wound in the _People's Banner_, and he was beginning to hope that
that nuisance would also be allowed to die away. He had seen Lady
Laura,--having dined in Grosvenor Place, where he had been petted
to his heart's content. His dinner had been cut up for him, and his
wound had been treated with the tenderest sympathy. And, singular to
say, no questions were asked. He had been to Kent and had come by
an accident. No more than that was told, and his dear sympathising
friends were content to receive so much information, and to ask for
no more. But he had not as yet seen Violet Effingham, and he was
beginning to think that this romance about Violet might as well be
brought to a close. He had not, however, as yet been able to go into
crowded rooms, and unless he went out to large parties he could not
be sure that he would meet Miss Effingham.
At last he resolved that he would tell Lady Laura the whole
truth,--not the truth about the duel, but the truth about Violet
Effingham, and ask for her assistance. When making this resolution, I
think that he must have forgotten much that he had learned of his
friend's character; and by making it, I think that he showed also
that he had not learned as much as his opportunities might have
taught him. He knew Lady Laura's obstinacy of purpose, he knew her
devotion to her brother, and he knew also how desirous she had been
that her brother should win Violet Effingham for himself. This
knowledge should, I think, have sufficed to show him how improbable
it was that Lady Laura should assist him in his enterprise. But
beyond all this was the fact,--a fact as to the consequences of which
Phineas himself was entirely blind, beautifully ignorant,--that Lady
Laura had once condescended to love himself. Nay;--she had gone
farther than this, and had ventured to tell him, even after her
marriage, that the remembrance of some feeling that had once dwelt in
her heart in regard to him was still a danger to her. She had warned
him from Loughlinter, and then had received him in London;--and now
he selected her as his confidante in this love affair! Had he not
been beautifully ignorant and most modestly blind, he would surely
have placed his confidence elsewhere.
It was not that Lady Laura Kennedy ever confessed to herself the
existence of a vicious passion. She had, indeed, learned to tell
herself that she could not love her husband; and once, in the
excitement of such silent announcements to herself, she had asked
herself whether her heart was quite a blank, and had answered herself
by desiring Phineas Finn to absent himself from Loughlinter. During
all the subsequent winter she had scourged herself inwardly for her
own imprudence, her quite unnecessary folly in so doing. What! could
not she, Laura Standish, who from her earliest years of girlish
womanhood had resolved that she would use the world as men use it,
and not as women do,--could not she have felt the slight shock of
a passing tenderness for a handsome youth without allowing the
feeling to be a rock before her big enough and sharp enough for the
destruction of her entire barque? Could not she command, if not her
heart, at any rate her mind, so that she might safely assure herself
that, whether this man or any man was here or there, her course would
be unaltered? What though Phineas Finn had been in the same house
with her throughout all the winter, could not she have so lived with
him on terms of friendship, that every deed and word and look of her
friendship might have been open to her husband,--or open to all
the world? She could have done so. She told herself that that was
not,--need not have been her great calamity. Whether she could endure
the dull, monotonous control of her slow but imperious lord,--or
whether she must not rather tell him that it was not to be
endured,--that was her trouble. So she told herself, and again
admitted Phineas to her intimacy in London. But, nevertheless,
Phineas, had he not been beautifully ignorant and most blind to his
own achievements, would not have expected from Lady Laura Kennedy
assistance with Miss Violet Effingham.
Phineas knew when to find Lady Laura alone, and he came upon her one
day at the favourable hour. The two first clauses of the bill had
been passed after twenty fights and endless divisions. Two points had
been settled, as to which, however, Mr. Gresham had been driven to
give way so far and to yield so much, that men declared that such
a bill as the Government could consent to call its own could never
be passed by that Parliament in that session. Immediately on his
entrance into her room Lady Laura began about the third clause. Would
the House let Mr. Gresham have his way about the--? Phineas stopped
her at once. "My dear friend," he said, "I have come to you in a
private trouble, and I want you to drop politics for half an hour. I
have come to you for help."
"A private trouble, Mr. Finn! Is it serious?"
"It is very serious,--but it is no trouble of the kind of which you
are thinking. But it is serious enough to take up every thought."
"Can I help you?"
"Indeed you can. Whether you will or no is a different thing."
"I would help you in anything in my power, Mr. Finn. Do you not know
it?"
"You have been very kind to me!"
"And so would Mr. Kennedy."
"Mr. Kennedy cannot help me here."
"What is it, Mr. Finn?"
"I suppose I may as well tell you at once,--in plain language, I do
not know how to put my story into words that shall fit it. I love
Violet Effingham. Will you help me to win her to be my wife?"
"You love Violet Effingham!" said Lady Laura. And as she spoke the
look of her countenance towards him was so changed that he became at
once aware that from her no assistance might be expected. His eyes
were not opened in any degree to the second reason above given for
Lady Laura's opposition to his wishes, but he instantly perceived
that she would still cling to that destination of Violet's hand which
had for years past been the favourite scheme of her life. "Have you
not always known, Mr. Finn, what have been our hopes for Violet?"
Phineas, though he had perceived his mistake, felt that he must go
on with his cause. Lady Laura must know his wishes sooner or later,
and it was as well that she should learn them in this way as in
any other. "Yes;--but I have known also, from your brother's own
lips,--and indeed from yours also, Lady Laura,--that Chiltern has
been three times refused by Miss Effingham."
"What does that matter? Do men never ask more than three times?"
"And must I be debarred for ever while he prosecutes a hopeless
suit?"
"Yes;--you of all men."
"Why so, Lady Laura?"
"Because in this matter you have been his chosen friend,--and mine.
We have told you everything, trusting to you. We have believed in
your honour. We have thought that with you, at any rate, we were
safe." These words were very bitter to Phineas, and yet when he had
written his letter at Loughton, he had intended to be so perfectly
honest, chivalrously honest! Now Lady Laura spoke to him and looked
at him as though he had been most basely false--most untrue to that
noble friendship which had been lavished upon him by all her family.
He felt that he would become the prey of her most injurious thoughts
unless he could fully explain his ideas, and he felt, also, that the
circumstances did not admit of his explaining them. He could not take
up the argument on Violet's side, and show how unfair it would be to
her that she should be debarred from the homage due to her by any man
who really loved her, because Lord Chiltern chose to think that he
still had a claim,--or at any rate a chance. And Phineas knew well
of himself,--or thought that he knew well,--that he would not have
interfered had there been any chance for Lord Chiltern. Lord Chiltern
had himself told him more than once that there was no such chance.
How was he to explain all this to Lady Laura? "Mr. Finn," said Lady
Laura, "I can hardly believe this of you, even when you tell it me
yourself."
"Listen to me, Lady Laura, for a moment."
"Certainly, I will listen. But that you should come to me for
assistance! I cannot understand it. Men sometimes become harder than
stones."
"I do not think that I am hard." Poor blind fool! He was still
thinking only of Violet, and of the accusation made against him that
he was untrue to his friendship for Lord Chiltern. Of that other
accusation which could not be expressed in open words he understood
nothing,--nothing at all as yet.
"Hard and false,--capable of receiving no impression beyond the
outside husk of the heart."
"Oh, Lady Laura, do not say that. If you could only know how true I
am in my affection for you all."
"And how do you show it?--by coming in between Oswald and the only
means that are open to us of reconciling him to his father;--means
that have been explained to you exactly as though you had been one of
ourselves. Oswald has treated you as a brother in the matter, telling
you everything, and this is the way you would repay him for his
confidence!"
"Can I help it, that I have learnt to love this girl?"
"Yes, sir,--you can help it. What if she had been Oswald's
wife;--would you have loved her then? Do you speak of loving a woman
as if it were an affair of fate, over which you have no control? I
doubt whether your passions are so strong as that. You had better put
aside your love for Miss Effingham. I feel assured that it will never
hurt you." Then some remembrance of what had passed between him and
Lady Laura Standish near the falls of the Linter, when he first
visited Scotland, came across his mind. "Believe me," she said with a
smile, "this little wound in your heart will soon be cured."
He stood silent before her, looking away from her, thinking over it
all. He certainly had believed himself to be violently in love with
Lady Laura, and yet when he had just now entered her drawing-room, he
had almost forgotten that there had been such a passage in his life.
And he had believed that she had forgotten it,--even though she
had counselled him not to come to Loughlinter within the last nine
months! He had been a boy then, and had not known himself;--but now
he was a man, and was proud of the intensity of his love. There came
upon him some passing throb of pain from his shoulder, reminding him
of the duel, and he was proud also of that. He had been willing to
risk everything,--life, prospects, and position,--sooner than abandon
the slight hope which was his of possessing Violet Effingham. And now
he was told that this wound in his heart would soon be cured, and
was told so by a woman to whom he had once sung a song of another
passion. It is very hard to answer a woman in such circumstances,
because her womanhood gives her so strong a ground of vantage! Lady
Laura might venture to throw in his teeth the fickleness of his
heart, but he could not in reply tell her that to change a love was
better than to marry without love,--that to be capable of such a
change showed no such inferiority of nature as did the capacity for
such a marriage. She could hit him with her argument; but he could
only remember his, and think how violent might be the blow he could
inflict,--if it were not that she were a woman, and therefore
guarded. "You will not help me then?" he said, when they had both
been silent for a while.
"Help you? How should I help you?"
"I wanted no other help than this,--that I might have had an
opportunity of meeting Violet here, and of getting from her some
answer."
"Has the question then never been asked already?" said Lady Laura.
To this Phineas made no immediate reply. There was no reason why he
should show his whole hand to an adversary. "Why do you not go to
Lady Baldock's house?" continued Lady Laura. "You are admitted there.
You know Lady Baldock. Go and ask her to stand your friend with her
niece. See what she will say to you. As far as I understand these
matters, that is the fair, honourable, open way in which gentlemen
are wont to make their overtures."
"I would make mine to none but to herself," said Phineas.
"Then why have you made it to me, sir?" demanded Lady Laura.
"I have come to you as I would to my sister."
"Your sister? Psha! I am not your sister, Mr. Finn. Nor, were I so,
should I fail to remember that I have a dearer brother to whom my
faith is pledged. Look here. Within the last three weeks Oswald has
sacrificed everything to his father, because he was determined that
Mr. Kennedy should have the money which he thought was due to my
husband. He has enabled my father to do what he will with Saulsby.
Papa will never hurt him;--I know that. Hard as papa is with him, he
will never hurt Oswald's future position. Papa is too proud to do
that. Violet has heard what Oswald has done; and now that he has
nothing of his own to offer her for the future but his bare title,
now that he has given papa power to do what he will with the
property, I believe that she would accept him instantly. That is her
disposition."
Phineas again paused a moment before he replied. "Let him try," he
said.
"He is away,--in Brussels."
"Send to him, and bid him return. I will be patient, Lady Laura. Let
him come and try, and I will bide my time. I confess that I have no
right to interfere with him if there be a chance for him. If there is
no chance, my right is as good as that of any other."
There was something in this which made Lady Laura feel that she
could not maintain her hostility against this man on behalf of her
brother;--and yet she could not force herself to be other than
hostile to him. Her heart was sore, and it was he that had made
it sore. She had lectured herself, schooling herself with mental
sackcloth and ashes, rebuking herself with heaviest censures from day
to day, because she had found herself to be in danger of regarding
this man with a perilous love; and she had been constant in this
work of penance till she had been able to assure herself that the
sackcloth and ashes had done their work, and that the danger was
past. "I like him still and love him well," she had said to herself
with something almost of triumph, "but I have ceased to think of him
as one who might have been my lover." And yet she was now sick and
sore, almost beside herself with the agony of the wound, because this
man whom she had been able to throw aside from her heart had also
been able so to throw her aside. And she felt herself constrained to
rebuke him with what bitterest words she might use. She had felt it
easy to do this at first, on her brother's score. She had accused him
of treachery to his friendship,--both as to Oswald and as to herself.
On that she could say cutting words without subjecting herself to
suspicion even from herself. But now this power was taken away from
her, and still she wished to wound him. She desired to taunt him
with his old fickleness, and yet to subject herself to no imputation.
"Your right!" she said. "What gives you any right in the matter?"
"Simply the right of a fair field, and no favour."
"And yet you come to me for favour,--to me, because I am her friend.
You cannot win her yourself, and think I may help you! I do not
believe in your love for her. There! If there were no other reason,
and I could help you, I would not, because I think your heart is a
sham heart. She is pretty, and has money--"
"Lady Laura!"
"She is pretty, and has money, and is the fashion. I do not wonder
that you should wish to have her. But, Mr. Finn, I believe that
Oswald really loves her;--and that you do not. His nature is deeper
than yours."
He understood it all now as he listened to the tone of her voice, and
looked into the lines of her face. There was written there plainly
enough that spretæ injuria formæ of which she herself was conscious,
but only conscious. Even his eyes, blind as he had been, were
opened,--and he knew that he had been a fool.
"I am sorry that I came to you," he said.
"It would have been better that you should not have done so," she
replied.
"And yet perhaps it is well that there should be no misunderstanding
between us."
"Of course I must tell my brother."
He paused but for a moment, and then he answered her with a sharp
voice, "He has been told."
"And who told him?"
"I did. I wrote to him the moment that I knew my own mind. I owed it
to him to do so. But my letter missed him, and he only learned it the
other day."
"Have you seen him since?"
"Yes;--I have seen him."
"And what did he say? How did he take it? Did he bear it from you
quietly?"
"No, indeed;" and Phineas smiled as he spoke.
"Tell me, Mr. Finn; what happened? What is to be done?"
"Nothing is to be done. Everything has been done. I may as well
tell you all. I am sure that for the sake of me, as well as of your
brother, you will keep our secret. He required that I should either
give up my suit, or that I should,--fight him. As I could not comply
with the one request, I found myself bound to comply with the other."
"And there has been a duel?"
"Yes;--there has been a duel. We went over to Belgium, and it was
soon settled. He wounded me here in the arm."
"Suppose you had killed him, Mr. Finn?"
"That, Lady Laura, would have been a misfortune so terrible that I
was bound to prevent it." Then he paused again, regretting what he
had said. "You have surprised me, Lady Laura, into an answer that I
should not have made. I may be sure,--may I not,--that my words will
not go beyond yourself?"
"Yes;--you may be sure of that." This she said plaintively, with a
tone of voice and demeanour of body altogether different from that
which she lately bore. Neither of them knew what was taking place
between them; but she was, in truth, gradually submitting herself
again to this man's influence. Though she rebuked him at every turn
for what he said, for what he had done, for what he proposed to do,
still she could not teach herself to despise him, or even to cease to
love him for any part of it. She knew it all now,--except that word
or two which had passed between Violet and Phineas in the rides of
Saulsby Park. But she suspected something even of that, feeling sure
that the only matter on which Phineas would say nothing would be
that of his own success,--if success there had been. "And so you and
Oswald have quarrelled, and there has been a duel. That is why you
were away?"
"That is why I was away."
"How wrong of you,--how very wrong! Had he been,--killed, how could
you have looked us in the face again?"
"I could not have looked you in the face again."
"But that is over now. And were you friends afterwards?"
"No;--we did not part as friends. Having gone there to fight with
him,--most unwillingly,--I could not afterwards promise him that I
would give up Miss Effingham. You say she will accept him now. Let
him come and try." She had nothing further to say,--no other argument
to use. There was the soreness at her heart still present to her,
making her wretched, instigating her to hurt him if she knew how to
do so, in spite of her regard for him. But she felt that she was weak
and powerless. She had shot her arrows at him,--all but one,--and if
she used that, its poisoned point would wound herself far more surely
than it would touch him. "The duel was very silly," he said. "You
will not speak of it."
"No; certainly not."
"I am glad at least that I have told you everything."
"I do not know why you should be glad. I cannot help you."
"And you will say nothing to Violet?"
"Everything that I can say in Oswald's favour. I will say nothing of
the duel; but beyond that you have no right to demand my secrecy with
her. Yes; you had better go, Mr. Finn, for I am hardly well. And
remember this,--If you can forget this little episode about Miss
Effingham, so will I forget it also; and so will Oswald. I can
promise for him." Then she smiled and gave him her hand, and he went.
She rose from her chair as he left the room, and waited till she
heard the sound of the great door closing behind him before she again
sat down. Then, when he was gone,--when she was sure that he was no
longer there with her in the same house,--she laid her head down upon
the arm of the sofa, and burst into a flood of tears. She was no
longer angry with Phineas. There was no further longing in her heart
for revenge. She did not now desire to injure him, though she had
done so as long as he was with her. Nay,--she resolved instantly,
almost instinctively, that Lord Brentford must know nothing of all
this, lest the political prospects of the young member for Loughton
should be injured. To have rebuked him, to rebuke him again and
again, would be only fair,--would at least be womanly; but she
would protect him from all material injury as far as her power of
protection might avail. And why was she weeping now so bitterly?
Of course she asked herself, as she rubbed away the tears with her
hands,--Why should she weep? She was not weak enough to tell herself
that she was weeping for any injury that had been done to Oswald.
She got up suddenly from the sofa, and pushed away her hair from her
face, and pushed away the tears from her cheeks, and then clenched
her fists as she held them out at full length from her body, and
stood, looking up with her eyes fixed upon the wall. "Ass!" she
exclaimed. "Fool! Idiot! That I should not be able to crush it into
nothing and have done with it! Why should he not have her? After all,
he is better than Oswald. Oh,--is that you?" The door of the room had
been opened while she was standing thus, and her husband had entered.
"Yes,--it is I. Is anything wrong?"
"Very much is wrong."
"What is it, Laura?"
"You cannot help me."
"If you are in trouble you should tell me what it is, and leave it to
me to try to help you."
"Nonsense!" she said, shaking her head.
"Laura, that is uncourteous,--not to say undutiful also."
"I suppose it was,--both. I beg your pardon, but I could not help
it."
"Laura, you should help such words to me."
"There are moments, Robert, when even a married woman must be
herself rather than her husband's wife. It is so, though you cannot
understand it."
"I certainly do not understand it."
"You cannot make a woman subject to you as a dog is so. You may have
all the outside and as much of the inside as you can master. With a
dog you may be sure of both."
"I suppose this means that you have secrets in which I am not to
share."
"I have troubles about my father and my brother which you cannot
share. My brother is a ruined man."
"Who ruined him?"
"I will not talk about it any more. I will not speak to you of him or
of papa. I only want you to understand that there is a subject which
must be secret to myself, and on which I may be allowed to shed
tears,--if I am so weak. I will not trouble you on a matter in which
I have not your sympathy." Then she left him, standing in the middle
of the room, depressed by what had occurred,--but not thinking of it
as of a trouble which would do more than make him uncomfortable for
that day.
CHAPTER XL
Madame Max Goesler
Day after day, and clause after clause, the bill was fought in
committee, and few men fought with more constancy on the side of the
Ministers than did the member for Loughton. Troubled though he was by
his quarrel with Lord Chiltern, by his love for Violet Effingham, by
the silence of his friend Lady Laura,--for since he had told her of
the duel she had become silent to him, never writing to him, and
hardly speaking to him when she met him in society,--nevertheless
Phineas was not so troubled but what he could work at his vocation.
Now, when he would find himself upon his legs in the House, he would
wonder at the hesitation which had lately troubled him so sorely. He
would sit sometimes and speculate upon that dimness of eye, upon that
tendency of things to go round, upon that obtrusive palpitation of
heart, which had afflicted him so seriously for so long a time. The
House now was no more to him than any other chamber, and the members
no more than other men. He guarded himself from orations, speaking
always very shortly,--because he believed that policy and good
judgment required that he should be short. But words were very easy
to him, and he would feel as though he could talk for ever. And there
quickly came to him a reputation for practical usefulness. He was a
man with strong opinions, who could yet be submissive. And no man
seemed to know how his reputation had come. He had made one good
speech after two or three failures. All who knew him, his whole
party, had been aware of his failure; and his one good speech had
been regarded by many as no very wonderful effort. But he was a man
who was pleasant to other men,--not combative, not self-asserting
beyond the point at which self-assertion ceases to be a necessity of
manliness. Nature had been very good to him, making him comely inside
and out,--and with this comeliness he had crept into popularity.
The secret of the duel was, I think, at this time, known to a great
many men and women. So Phineas perceived; but it was not, he thought,
known either to Lord Brentford or to Violet Effingham. And in this
he was right. No rumour of it had yet reached the ears of either of
these persons;--and rumour, though she flies so fast and so far, is
often slow in reaching those ears which would be most interested in
her tidings. Some dim report of the duel reached even Mr. Kennedy,
and he asked his wife. "Who told you?" said she, sharply.
"Bonteen told me that it was certainly so."
"Mr. Bonteen always knows more than anybody else about everything
except his own business."
"Then it is not true?"
Lady Laura paused,--and then she lied. "Of course it is not true. I
should be very sorry to ask either of them, but to me it seems to be
the most improbable thing in life." Then Mr. Kennedy believed that
there had been no duel. In his wife's word he put absolute faith, and
he thought that she would certainly know anything that her brother
had done. As he was a man given to but little discourse, he asked no
further questions about the duel either in the House or at the Clubs.
At first, Phineas had been greatly dismayed when men had asked
him questions tending to elicit from him some explanation of the
mystery;--but by degrees he became used to it, and as the tidings
which had got abroad did not seem to injure him, and as the
questionings were not pushed very closely, he became indifferent.
There came out another article in the _People's Banner_ in which Lord
C----n and Mr. P----s F----n were spoken of as glaring examples of
that aristocratic snobility,--that was the expressive word coined,
evidently with great delight, for the occasion,--which the rotten
state of London society in high quarters now produced. Here was
a young lord, infamously notorious, quarrelling with one of his
boon-companions, whom he had appointed to a private seat in the
House of Commons, fighting duels, breaking the laws, scandalising
the public,--and all this was done without punishment to the guilty!
There were old stories afloat,--so said the article--of what in a
former century had been done by Lord Mohuns and Mr. Bests; but now,
in 186--, &c. &c. &c. And so the article went on. Any reader may fill
in without difficulty the concluding indignation and virtuous appeal
for reform in social morals as well as Parliament. But Phineas had so
far progressed that he had almost come to like this kind of thing.
Certainly I think that the duel did him no harm in society. Otherwise
he would hardly have been asked to a semi-political dinner at Lady
Glencora Palliser's, even though he might have been invited to make
one of the five hundred guests who were crowded into her saloons
and staircases after the dinner was over. To have been one of the
five hundred was nothing; but to be one of the sixteen was a great
deal,--was indeed so much that Phineas, not understanding as yet the
advantage of his own comeliness, was at a loss to conceive why so
pleasant an honour was conferred upon him. There was no man among the
eight men at the dinner-party not in Parliament,--and the only other
except Phineas not attached to the Government was Mr. Palliser's
great friend, John Grey, the member for Silverbridge. There were four
Cabinet Ministers in the room,--the Duke, Lord Cantrip, Mr. Gresham,
and the owner of the mansion. There was also Barrington Erle and
young Lord Fawn, an Under-Secretary of State. But the wit and grace
of the ladies present lent more of character to the party than even
the position of the men. Lady Glencora Palliser herself was a host.
There was no woman then in London better able to talk to a dozen
people on a dozen subjects; and then, moreover, she was still in
the flush of her beauty and the bloom of her youth. Lady Laura was
there;--by what means divided from her husband Phineas could not
imagine; but Lady Glencora was good at such divisions. Lady Cantrip
had been allowed to come with her lord;--but, as was well understood,
Lord Cantrip was not so manifestly a husband as was Mr. Kennedy.
There are men who cannot guard themselves from the assertion of
marital rights at most inappropriate moments. Now Lord Cantrip lived
with his wife most happily; yet you should pass hours with him and
her together, and hardly know that they knew each other. One of the
Duke's daughters was there,--but not the Duchess, who was known to be
heavy;--and there was the beauteous Marchioness of Hartletop. Violet
Effingham was in the room also,--giving Phineas a blow at the heart
as he saw her smile. Might it be that he could speak a word to her on
this occasion? Mr. Grey had also brought his wife;--and then there
was Madame Max Goesler. Phineas found that it was his fortune to take
down to dinner,--not Violet Effingham, but Madame Max Goesler. And,
when he was placed at dinner, on the other side of him there sat Lady
Hartletop, who addressed the few words which she spoke exclusively
to Mr. Palliser. There had been in former days matters difficult of
arrangement between those two; but I think that those old passages
had now been forgotten by them both. Phineas was, therefore, driven
to depend exclusively on Madame Max Goesler for conversation, and
he found that he was not called upon to cast his seed into barren
ground.
Up to that moment he had never heard of Madame Max Goesler. Lady
Glencora, in introducing them, had pronounced the lady's name so
clearly that he had caught it with accuracy, but he could not surmise
whence she had come, or why she was there. She was a woman probably
something over thirty years of age. She had thick black hair, which
she wore in curls,--unlike anybody else in the world,--in curls which
hung down low beneath her face, covering, and perhaps intended to
cover, a certain thinness in her cheeks which would otherwise have
taken something from the charm of her countenance. Her eyes were
large, of a dark blue colour, and very bright,--and she used them in
a manner which is as yet hardly common with Englishwomen. She seemed
to intend that you should know that she employed them to conquer
you, looking as a knight may have looked in olden days who entered a
chamber with his sword drawn from the scabbard and in his hand. Her
forehead was broad and somewhat low. Her nose was not classically
beautiful, being broader at the nostrils than beauty required, and,
moreover, not perfectly straight in its line. Her lips were thin.
Her teeth, which she endeavoured to show as little as possible, were
perfect in form and colour. They who criticised her severely said,
however, that they were too large. Her chin was well formed, and
divided by a dimple which gave to her face a softness of grace which
would otherwise have been much missed. But perhaps her great beauty
was in the brilliant clearness of her dark complexion. You might
almost fancy that you could see into it so as to read the different
lines beneath the skin. She was somewhat tall, though by no means
tall to a fault, and was so thin as to be almost meagre in her
proportions. She always wore her dress close up to her neck, and
never showed the bareness of her arms. Though she was the only woman
so clad now present in the room, this singularity did not specially
strike one, because in other respects her apparel was so rich and
quaint as to make inattention to it impossible. The observer who did
not observe very closely would perceive that Madame Max Goesler's
dress was unlike the dress of other women, but seeing that it was
unlike in make, unlike in colour, and unlike in material, the
ordinary observer would not see also that it was unlike in form for
any other purpose than that of maintaining its general peculiarity
of character. In colour she was abundant, and yet the fabric of
her garment was always black. My pen may not dare to describe the
traceries of yellow and ruby silk which went in and out through
the black lace, across her bosom, and round her neck, and over her
shoulders, and along her arms, and down to the very ground at her
feet, robbing the black stuff of all its sombre solemnity, and
producing a brightness in which there was nothing gaudy. She wore
no vestige of crinoline, and hardly anything that could be called a
train. And the lace sleeves of her dress, with their bright traceries
of silk, were fitted close to her arms; and round her neck she wore
the smallest possible collar of lace, above which there was a short
chain of Roman gold with a ruby pendant. And she had rubies in her
ears, and a ruby brooch, and rubies in the bracelets on her arms.
Such, as regarded the outward woman, was Madame Max Goesler; and
Phineas, as he took his place by her side, thought that fortune for
the nonce had done well with him,--only that he should have liked it
so much better could he have been seated next to Violet Effingham!
I have said that in the matter of conversation his morsel of seed was
not thrown into barren ground. I do not know that he can truly be
said to have produced even a morsel. The subjects were all mooted
by the lady, and so great was her fertility in discoursing that all
conversational grasses seemed to grow with her spontaneously. "Mr.
Finn," she said, "what would I not give to be a member of the British
Parliament at such a moment as this!"
"Why at such a moment as this particularly?"
"Because there is something to be done, which, let me tell you,
senator though you are, is not always the case with you."
"My experience is short, but it sometimes seems to me that there is
too much to be done."
"Too much of nothingness, Mr. Finn. Is not that the case? But now
there is a real fight in the lists. The one great drawback to the
life of women is that they cannot act in politics."
"And which side would you take?"
"What, here in England?" said Madame Max Goesler,--from which
expression, and from one or two others of a similar nature, Phineas
was led into a doubt whether the lady were a countrywoman of his
or not. "Indeed, it is hard to say. Politically I should want to
out-Turnbull Mr. Turnbull, to vote for everything that could be
voted for,--ballot, manhood suffrage, womanhood suffrage, unlimited
right of striking, tenant right, education of everybody, annual
parliaments, and the abolition of at least the bench of bishops."
"That is a strong programme," said Phineas.
"It is strong, Mr. Finn, but that's what I should like. I think,
however, that I should be tempted to feel a dastard security in the
conviction that I might advocate my views without any danger of
seeing them carried out. For, to tell you the truth, I don't at all
want to put down ladies and gentlemen."
"You think that they would go with the bench of bishops?"
"I don't want anything to go,--that is, as far as real life is
concerned. There's that dear good Bishop of Abingdon is the best
friend I have in the world,--and as for the Bishop of Dorchester,
I'd walk from here to there to hear him preach. And I'd sooner hem
aprons for them all myself than that they should want those pretty
decorations. But then, Mr. Finn, there is such a difference between
life and theory;--is there not?"
"And it is so comfortable to have theories that one is not bound to
carry out," said Phineas.
"Isn't it? Mr. Palliser, do you live up to your political theories?"
At this moment Mr. Palliser was sitting perfectly silent between Lady
Hartletop and the Duke's daughter, and he gave a little spring in his
chair as this sudden address was made to him. "Your House of Commons
theories, I mean, Mr. Palliser. Mr. Finn is saying that it is
very well to have far advanced ideas,--it does not matter how
far advanced,--because one is never called upon to act upon them
practically."
"That is a dangerous doctrine, I think," said Mr. Palliser.
"But pleasant,--so at least Mr. Finn says."
"It is at least very common," said Phineas, not caring to protect
himself by a contradiction.
"For myself," said Mr. Palliser gravely, "I think I may say that I
always am really anxious to carry into practice all those doctrines
of policy which I advocate in theory."
During this conversation Lady Hartletop sat as though no word of it
reached her ears. She did not understand Madame Max Goesler, and by
no means loved her. Mr. Palliser, when he had made his little speech,
turned to the Duke's daughter and asked some question about the
conservatories at Longroyston.
"I have called forth a word of wisdom," said Madame Max Goesler,
almost in a whisper.
"Yes," said Phineas, "and taught a Cabinet Minister to believe that
I am a most unsound politician. You may have ruined my prospects for
life, Madame Max Goesler."
"Let me hope not. As far as I can understand the way of things in
your Government, the aspirants to office succeed chiefly by making
themselves uncommonly unpleasant to those who are in power. If a man
can hit hard enough he is sure to be taken into the elysium of the
Treasury bench,--not that he may hit others, but that he may cease to
hit those who are there. I don't think men are chosen because they
are useful."
"You are very severe upon us all."
"Indeed, as far as I can see, one man is as useful as another. But
to put aside joking,--they tell me that you are sure to become a
minister."
Phineas felt that he blushed. Could it be that people said of him
behind his back that he was a man likely to rise high in political
position? "Your informants are very kind," he replied awkwardly,
"but I do not know who they are. I shall never get up in the way you
describe,--that is, by abusing the men I support."
After that Madame Max Goesler turned round to Mr. Grey, who was
sitting on the other side of her, and Phineas was left for a moment
in silence. He tried to say a word to Lady Hartletop, but Lady
Hartletop only bowed her head gracefully in recognition of the truth
of the statement he made. So he applied himself for a while to his
dinner.
"What do you think of Miss Effingham?" said Madame Max Goesler, again
addressing him suddenly.
"What do I think about her?"
"You know her, I suppose."
"Oh yes, I know her. She is closely connected with the Kennedys, who
are friends of mine."
"So I have heard. They tell me that scores of men are raving about
her. Are you one of them?"
"Oh yes;--I don't mind being one of sundry scores. There is nothing
particular in owning to that."
"But you admire her?"
"Of course I do," said Phineas.
"Ah, I see you are joking. I do amazingly. They say women never do
admire women, but I most sincerely do admire Miss Effingham."
"Is she a friend of yours?"
"Oh no;--I must not dare to say so much as that. I was with her last
winter for a week at Matching, and of course I meet her about at
people's houses. She seems to me to be the most independent girl I
ever knew in my life. I do believe that nothing would make her marry
a man unless she loved him and honoured him, and I think it is so
very seldom that you can say that of a girl."
"I believe so also," said Phineas. Then he paused a moment before he
continued to speak. "I cannot say that I know Miss Effingham very
intimately, but from what I have seen of her, I should think it very
probable that she may not marry at all."
"Very probably," said Madame Max Goesler, who then again turned away
to Mr. Grey.
Ten minutes after this, when the moment was just at hand in which the
ladies were to retreat, Madame Max Goesler again addressed Phineas,
looking very full into his face as she did so. "I wonder whether the
time will ever come, Mr. Finn, in which you will give me an account
of that day's journey to Blankenberg?"
"To Blankenberg!"
"Yes;--to Blankenberg. I am not asking for it now. But I shall look
for it some day." Then Lady Glencora rose from her seat, and Madame
Max Goesler went out with the others.
CHAPTER XLI
Lord Fawn
What had Madame Max Goesler to do with his journey to Blankenberg?
thought Phineas, as he sat for a while in silence between Mr.
Palliser and Mr. Grey; and why should she, who was a perfect
stranger to him, have dared to ask him such a question? But as the
conversation round the table, after the ladies had gone, soon drifted
into politics and became general, Phineas, for a while, forgot Madame
Max Goesler and the Blankenberg journey, and listened to the eager
words of Cabinet Ministers, now and again uttering a word of his own,
and showing that he, too, was as eager as others. But the session
in Mr. Palliser's dining-room was not long, and Phineas soon found
himself making his way amidst a throng of coming guests into the
rooms above. His object was to meet Violet Effingham, but, failing
that, he would not be unwilling to say a few more words to Madame Max
Goesler.
He first encountered Lady Laura, to whom he had not spoken as yet,
and, finding himself standing close to her for a while, he asked her
after his late neighbour. "Do tell me one thing, Lady Laura;--who is
Madame Max Goesler, and why have I never met her before?"
"That will be two things, Mr. Finn; but I will answer both questions
as well as I can. You have not met her before, because she was in
Germany last spring and summer, and in the year before that you were
not about so much as you have been since. Still you must have seen
her, I think. She is the widow of an Austrian banker, and has lived
the greater part of her life at Vienna. She is very rich, and has a
small house in Park Lane, where she receives people so exclusively
that it has come to be thought an honour to be invited by Madame Max
Goesler. Her enemies say that her father was a German Jew, living in
England, in the employment of the Viennese bankers, and they say also
that she has been married a second time to an Austrian Count, to whom
she allows ever so much a year to stay away from her. But of all
this, nobody, I fancy, knows anything. What they do know is that
Madame Max Goesler spends seven or eight thousand a year, and that
she will give no man an opportunity of even asking her to marry him.
People used to be shy of her, but she goes almost everywhere now."
"She has not been at Portman Square?"
"Oh no; but then Lady Glencora is so much more advanced than we are!
After all, we are but humdrum people, as the world goes now."
Then Phineas began to roam about the rooms, striving to find an
opportunity of engrossing five minutes of Miss Effingham's attention.
During the time that Lady Laura was giving him the history of Madame
Max Goesler his eyes had wandered round, and he had perceived that
Violet was standing in the further corner of a large lobby on to
which the stairs opened,--so situated, indeed, that she could hardly
escape, because of the increasing crowd, but on that very account
almost impossible to be reached. He could see, also, that she was
talking to Lord Fawn, an unmarried peer of something over thirty
years of age, with an unrivalled pair of whiskers, a small estate,
and a rising political reputation. Lord Fawn had been talking to
Violet through the whole dinner, and Phineas was beginning to think
that he should like to make another journey to Blankenberg, with the
object of meeting his lordship on the sands. When Lady Laura had done
speaking, his eyes were turned through a large open doorway towards
the spot on which his idol was standing. "It is of no use, my
friend," she said, touching his arm. "I wish I could make you know
that it is of no use, because then I think you would be happier." To
this Phineas made no answer, but went and roamed about the rooms. Why
should it be of no use? Would Violet Effingham marry any man merely
because he was a lord?
Some half-hour after this he had succeeded in making his way up to
the place in which Violet was still standing, with Lord Fawn beside
her. "I have been making such a struggle to get to you," he said.
"And now you are here, you will have to stay, for it is impossible to
get out," she answered. "Lord Fawn has made the attempt half-a-dozen
times, but has failed grievously."
"I have been quite contented," said Lord Fawn;--"more than
contented."
Phineas felt that he ought to give some special reason to Miss
Effingham to account for his efforts to reach her, but yet he had
nothing special to say. Had Lord Fawn not been there, he would
immediately have told her that he was waiting for an answer to the
question he had asked her in Saulsby Park, but he could hardly do
this in presence of the noble Under-Secretary of State. She received
him with her pleasant genial smile, looking exactly as she had looked
when he had parted from her on the morning after their ride. She did
not show any sign of anger, or even of indifference at his approach.
But still it was almost necessary that he should account for his
search of her. "I have so longed to hear from you how you got on at
Loughlinter," he said.
"Yes,--yes; and I will tell you something of it some day, perhaps.
Why do you not come to Lady Baldock's?"
"I did not even know that Lady Baldock was in town."
"You ought to have known. Of course she is in town. Where did you
suppose I was living? Lord Fawn was there yesterday, and can tell you
that my aunt is quite blooming."
"Lady Baldock is blooming," said Lord Fawn; "certainly
blooming;--that is, if evergreens may be said to bloom."
"Evergreens do bloom, as well as spring plants, Lord Fawn. You come
and see her, Mr. Finn;--only you must bring a little money with you
for the Female Protestant Unmarried Women's Emigration Society. That
is my aunt's present hobby, as Lord Fawn knows to his cost."
"I wish I may never spend half-a-sovereign worse."
"But it is a perilous affair for me, as my aunt wants me to go out
as a sort of leading Protestant unmarried female emigrant pioneer
myself."
"You don't mean that," said Lord Fawn, with much anxiety.
"Of course you'll go," said Phineas. "I should, if I were you."
"I am in doubt," said Violet.
"It is such a grand prospect," said he. "Such an opening in life. So
much excitement, you know; and such a useful career."
"As if there were not plenty of opening here for Miss Effingham,"
said Lord Fawn, "and plenty of excitement."
"Do you think there is?" said Violet. "You are much more civil than
Mr. Finn, I must say." Then Phineas began to hope that he need not be
afraid of Lord Fawn. "What a happy man you were at dinner!" continued
Violet, addressing herself to Phineas.
"I thought Lord Fawn was the happy man."
"You had Madame Max Goesler all to yourself for nearly two hours, and
I suppose there was not a creature in the room who did not envy you.
I don't doubt that ever so much interest was made with Lady Glencora
as to taking Madame Max down to dinner. Lord Fawn, I know,
intrigued."
"Miss Effingham, really I must--contradict you."
"And Barrington Erle begged for it as a particular favour. The Duke,
with a sigh, owned that it was impossible, because of his cumbrous
rank; and Mr. Gresham, when it was offered to him, declared that
he was fatigued with the business of the House, and not up to the
occasion. How much did she say to you; and what did she talk about?"
"The ballot chiefly,--that, and manhood suffrage."
"Ah! she said something more than that, I am sure. Madame Max Goesler
never lets any man go without entrancing him. If you have anything
near your heart, Mr. Finn, Madame Max Goesler touched it, I am sure."
Now Phineas had two things near his heart,--political promotion and
Violet Effingham,--and Madame Max Goesler had managed to touch them
both. She had asked him respecting his journey to Blankenberg, and
had touched him very nearly in reference to Miss Effingham. "You know
Madame Max Goesler, of course?" said Violet to Lord Fawn.
"Oh yes, I know the lady;--that is, as well as other people do. No
one, I take it, knows much of her; and it seems to me that the world
is becoming tired of her. A mystery is good for nothing if it remains
always a mystery."
"And it is good for nothing at all when it is found out," said
Violet.
"And therefore it is that Madame Max Goesler is a bore," said Lord
Fawn.
"You did not find her a bore?" said Violet. Then Phineas, choosing
to oppose Lord Fawn as well as he could on that matter, as on every
other, declared that he had found Madame Max Goesler most delightful.
"And beautiful,--is she not?" said Violet.
"Beautiful!" exclaimed Lord Fawn.
"I think her very beautiful," said Phineas.
"So do I," said Violet. "And she is a dear ally of mine. We were a
week together last winter, and swore an undying friendship. She told
me ever so much about Mr. Goesler."
"But she told you nothing of her second husband?" said Lord Fawn.
"Now that you have run into scandal, I shall have done," said Violet.
Half an hour after this, when Phineas was preparing to fight his way
out of the house, he was again close to Madame Max Goesler. He had
not found a single moment in which to ask Violet for an answer to his
old question, and was retiring from the field discomfited, but not
dispirited. Lord Fawn, he thought, was not a serious obstacle in his
way. Lady Laura had told him that there was no hope for him; but
then Lady Laura's mind on that subject was, he thought, prejudiced.
Violet Effingham certainly knew what were his wishes, and knowing
them, smiled on him and was gracious to him. Would she do so if his
pretensions were thoroughly objectionable to her?
"I saw that you were successful this evening," said Madame Max
Goesler to him.
"I was not aware of any success."
"I call it great success to be able to make your way where you will
through such a crowd as there is here. You seem to me to be so stout
a cavalier that I shall ask you to find my servant, and bid him
get my carriage. Will you mind?" Phineas, of course, declared that
he would be delighted. "He is a German, and not in livery. But if
somebody will call out, he will hear. He is very sharp, and much more
attentive than your English footmen. An Englishman hardly ever makes
a good servant."
"Is that a compliment to us Britons?"
"No, certainly not. If a man is a servant, he should be clever enough
to be a good one." Phineas had now given the order for the carriage,
and, having returned, was standing with Madame Max Goesler in the
cloak-room. "After all, we are surely the most awkward people in
the world," she said. "You know Lord Fawn, who was talking to Miss
Effingham just now. You should have heard him trying to pay me a
compliment before dinner. It was like a donkey walking a minuet, and
yet they say he is a clever man and can make speeches." Could it be
possible that Madame Max Goesler's ears were so sharp that she had
heard the things which Lord Fawn had said of her?
"He is a well-informed man," said Phineas.
"For a lord, you mean," said Madame Max Goesler. "But he is an oaf,
is he not? And yet they say he is to marry that girl."
"I do not think he will," said Phineas, stoutly.
"I hope not, with all my heart; and I hope that somebody else
may,--unless somebody else should change his mind. Thank you; I am so
much obliged to you. Mind you come and call on me,--193, Park Lane. I
dare say you know the little cottage." Then he put Madame Max Goesler
into her carriage, and walked away to his club.
CHAPTER XLII
Lady Baldock Does Not Send a Card to Phineas Finn
Lady Baldock's house in Berkeley Square was very stately,--a large
house with five front windows in a row, and a big door, and a huge
square hall, and a fat porter in a round-topped chair;--but it was
dingy and dull, and could not have been painted for the last ten
years, or furnished for the last twenty. Nevertheless, Lady Baldock
had "evenings," and people went to them,--though not such a crowd of
people as would go to the evenings of Lady Glencora. Now Mr. Phineas
Finn had not been asked to the evenings of Lady Baldock for the
present season, and the reason was after this wise.
"Yes, Mr. Finn," Lady Baldock had said to her daughter, who, early in
the spring, was preparing the cards. "You may send one to Mr. Finn,
certainly."
"I don't know that he is very nice," said Augusta Boreham, whose eyes
at Saulsby had been sharper perhaps than her mother's, and who had
her suspicions.
But Lady Baldock did not like interference from her daughter. "Mr.
Finn, certainly," she continued. "They tell me that he is a very
rising young man, and he sits for Lord Brentford's borough. Of course
he is a Radical, but we cannot help that. All the rising young men
are Radicals now. I thought him very civil at Saulsby."
"But, mamma--"
"Well!"
"Don't you think that he is a little free with Violet?"
"What on earth do you mean, Augusta?"
"Have you not fancied that he is--fond of her?"
"Good gracious, no!"
"I think he is. And I have sometimes fancied that she is fond of him,
too."
"I don't believe a word of it, Augusta,--not a word. I should have
seen it if it was so. I am very sharp in seeing such things. They
never escape me. Even Violet would not be such a fool as that. Send
him a card, and if he comes I shall soon see." Miss Boreham quite
understood her mother, though she could never master her,--and the
card was prepared. Miss Boreham could never master her mother by her
own efforts; but it was, I think, by a little intrigue on her part
that Lady Baldock was mastered, and, indeed, altogether cowed, in
reference to our hero, and that this victory was gained on that very
afternoon in time to prevent the sending of the card.
When the mother and daughter were at tea, before dinner, Lord Baldock
came into the room, and, after having been patted and petted and
praised by his mother, he took up all the cards out of a china bowl
and ran his eyes over them. "Lord Fawn!" he said, "the greatest ass
in all London! Lady Hartletop! you know she won't come." "I don't
see why she shouldn't come," said Lady Baldock;--"a mere country
clergyman's daughter!" "Julius Cæsar Conway;--a great friend of mine,
and therefore he always blackballs my other friends at the club. Lord
Chiltern; I thought you were at daggers drawn with Chiltern." "They
say he is going to be reconciled to his father, Gustavus, and I do it
for Lord Brentford's sake. And he won't come, so it does not signify.
And I do believe that Violet has really refused him." "You are quite
right about his not coming," said Lord Baldock, continuing to read
the cards; "Chiltern certainly won't come. Count Sparrowsky;--I
wonder what you know about Sparrowsky that you should ask him here."
"He is asked about, Gustavus; he is indeed," pleaded Lady Baldock. "I
believe that Sparrowsky is a penniless adventurer. Mr. Monk; well,
he is a Cabinet Minister. Sir Gregory Greeswing; you mix your people
nicely at any rate. Sir Gregory Greeswing is the most old-fashioned
Tory in England." "Of course we are not political, Gustavus."
"Phineas Finn. They come alternately,--one and one.
"Mr. Finn is asked everywhere, Gustavus."
"I don't doubt it. They say he is a very good sort of fellow. They
say also that Violet has found that out as well as other people."
"What do you mean, Gustavus?"
"I mean that everybody is saying that this Phineas Finn is going to
set himself up in the world by marrying your niece. He is quite right
to try it on, if he has a chance."
"I don't think he would be right at all," said Lady Baldock, with
much energy. "I think he would be wrong,--shamefully wrong. They say
he is the son of an Irish doctor, and that he hasn't a shilling in
the world."
"That is just why he would be right. What is such a man to do, but to
marry money? He's a deuced good-looking fellow, too, and will be sure
to do it."
"He should work for his money in the city, then, or somewhere there.
But I don't believe it, Gustavus; I don't, indeed."
"Very well. I only tell you what I hear. The fact is that he and
Chiltern have already quarrelled about her. If I were to tell you
that they have been over to Holland together and fought a duel about
her, you wouldn't believe that."
"Fought a duel about Violet! People don't fight duels now, and I
should not believe it."
"Very well. Then send your card to Mr. Finn." And, so saying, Lord
Baldock left the room.
Lady Baldock sat in silence for some time toasting her toes at the
fire, and Augusta Boreham sat by, waiting for orders. She felt pretty
nearly sure that new orders would be given if she did not herself
interfere. "You had better put by that card for the present, my
dear," said Lady Baldock at last. "I will make inquiries. I don't
believe a word of what Gustavus has said. I don't think that even
Violet is such a fool as that. But if rash and ill-natured people
have spoken of it, it may be as well to be careful."
"It is always well to be careful;--is it not, mamma?"
"Not but what I think it very improper that these things should be
said about a young woman; and as for the story of the duel, I don't
believe a word of it. It is absurd. I dare say that Gustavus invented
it at the moment, just to amuse himself."
The card of course was not sent, and Lady Baldock at any rate put so
much faith in her son's story as to make her feel it to be her duty
to interrogate her niece on the subject. Lady Baldock at this period
of her life was certainly not free from fear of Violet Effingham.
In the numerous encounters which took place between them, the aunt
seldom gained that amount of victory which would have completely
satisfied her spirit. She longed to be dominant over her niece as she
was dominant over her daughter; and when she found that she missed
such supremacy, she longed to tell Violet to depart from out her
borders, and be no longer niece of hers. But had she ever done so,
Violet would have gone at the instant, and then terrible things would
have followed. There is a satisfaction in turning out of doors a
nephew or niece who is pecuniarily dependent, but when the youthful
relative is richly endowed, the satisfaction is much diminished. It
is the duty of a guardian, no doubt, to look after the ward; but if
this cannot be done, the ward's money should at least be held with as
close a fist as possible. But Lady Baldock, though she knew that she
would be sorely wounded, poked about on her old body with the sharp
lances of disobedience, and struck with the cruel swords of satire,
if she took upon herself to scold or even to question Violet,
nevertheless would not abandon the pleasure of lecturing and
teaching. "It is my duty," she would say to herself, "and though it
be taken in a bad spirit, I will always perform my duty." So she
performed her duty, and asked Violet Effingham some few questions
respecting Phineas Finn. "My dear," she said, "do you remember
meeting a Mr. Finn at Saulsby?"
"A Mr. Finn, aunt! Why, he is a particular friend of mine. Of course
I do, and he was at Saulsby. I have met him there more than once.
Don't you remember that we were riding about together?"
"I remember that he was there, certainly; but I did not know that he
was a special--friend."
"Most especial, aunt. A 1, I may say;--among young men, I mean."
Lady Baldock was certainly the most indiscreet of old women in such a
matter as this, and Violet the most provoking of young ladies. Lady
Baldock, believing that there was something to fear,--as, indeed,
there was, much to fear,--should have been content to destroy the
card, and to keep the young lady away from the young gentleman,
if such keeping away was possible to her. But Miss Effingham was
certainly very wrong to speak of any young man as being A 1. Fond as
I am of Miss Effingham, I cannot justify her, and must acknowledge
that she used the most offensive phrase she could find, on purpose to
annoy her aunt.
"Violet," said Lady Baldock, bridling up, "I never heard such a word
before from the lips of a young lady."
"Not as A 1? I thought it simply meant very good."
"A 1 is a nobleman," said Lady Baldock.
"No, aunt;--A 1 is a ship,--a ship that is very good," said Violet.
"And do you mean to say that Mr. Finn is,--is,--is,--very good?"
"Yes, indeed. You ask Lord Brentford, and Mr. Kennedy. You know he
saved poor Mr. Kennedy from being throttled in the streets."
"That has nothing to do with it. A policeman might have done that."
"Then he would have been A 1 of policemen,--though A 1 does not mean
a policeman."
"He would have done his duty, and so perhaps did Mr. Finn."
"Of course he did, aunt. It couldn't have been his duty to stand
by and see Mr. Kennedy throttled. And he nearly killed one of the
men, and took the other prisoner with his own hands. And he made a
beautiful speech the other day. I read every word of it. I am so glad
he's a Liberal. I do like young men to be Liberals." Now Lord Baldock
was a Tory, as had been all the Lord Baldocks,--since the first who
had been bought over from the Whigs in the time of George III at the
cost of a barony.
"You have nothing to do with politics, Violet."
"Why shouldn't I have something to do with politics, aunt?"
"And I must tell you that your name is being very unpleasantly
mentioned in connection with that of this young man because of your
indiscretion."
"What indiscretion?" Violet, as she made her demand for a more direct
accusation, stood quite upright before her aunt, looking the old
woman full in the face,--almost with her arms akimbo.
"Calling him A 1, Violet."
"People have been talking about me and Mr. Finn, because I just now,
at this very moment, called him A 1 to you! If you want to scold me
about anything, aunt, do find out something less ridiculous than
that."
"It was most improper language,--and if you used it to me, I am sure
you would to others."
"To what others?"
"To Mr. Finn,--and those sort of people."
"Call Mr. Finn A 1 to his face! Well,--upon my honour I don't know
why I should not. Lord Chiltern says he rides beautifully, and if we
were talking about riding I might do so."
"You have no business to talk to Lord Chiltern about Mr. Finn at
all."
"Have I not? I thought that perhaps the one sin might palliate
the other. You know, aunt, no young lady, let her be ever so
ill-disposed, can marry two objectionable young men,--at the same
time."
"I said nothing about your marrying Mr. Finn."
"Then, aunt, what did you mean?"
"I meant that you should not allow yourself to be talked of with an
adventurer, a young man without a shilling, a person who has come
from nobody knows where in the bogs of Ireland."
"But you used to ask him here."
"Yes,--as long as he knew his place. But I shall not do so again. And
I must beg you to be circumspect."
"My dear aunt, we may as well understand each other. I will not be
circumspect, as you call it. And if Mr. Finn asked me to marry him
to-morrow, and if I liked him well enough, I would take him,--even
though he had been dug right out of a bog. Not only because I liked
him,--mind! If I were unfortunate enough to like a man who was
nothing, I would refuse him in spite of my liking,--because he was
nothing. But this young man is not nothing. Mr. Finn is a fine
fellow, and if there were no other reason to prevent my marrying him
than his being the son of a doctor, and coming out of the bogs, that
would not do so. Now I have made a clean breast to you as regards
Mr. Finn; and if you do not like what I've said, aunt, you must
acknowledge that you have brought it on yourself."
Lady Baldock was left for a time speechless. But no card was sent to
Phineas Finn.
CHAPTER XLIII
Promotion
Phineas got no card from Lady Baldock, but one morning he received
a note from Lord Brentford which was of more importance to him than
any card could have been. At this time, bit by bit, the Reform
Bill of the day had nearly made its way through the committee, but
had been so mutilated as to be almost impossible of recognition
by its progenitors. And there was still a clause or two as to
the rearrangement of seats, respecting which it was known that
there would be a combat,--probably combats,--carried on after the
internecine fashion. There was a certain clipping of counties to be
done, as to which it was said that Mr. Daubeny had declared that
he would not yield till he was made to do so by the brute force of
majorities;--and there was another clause for the drafting of certain
superfluous members from little boroughs, and bestowing them on
populous towns at which they were much wanted, respecting which
Mr. Turnbull had proclaimed that the clause as it now stood was a
fainéant clause, capable of doing, and intended to do, no good in the
proper direction; a clause put into the bill to gull ignorant folk
who had not eyes enough to recognise the fact that it was fainéant; a
make-believe clause,--so said Mr. Turnbull,--to be detested on that
account by every true reformer worse than the old Philistine bonds
and Tory figments of representation, as to which there was at least
no hypocritical pretence of popular fitness. Mr. Turnbull had been
very loud and very angry,--had talked much of demonstrations among
the people, and had almost threatened the House. The House in its
present mood did not fear any demonstrations,--but it did fear that
Mr. Turnbull might help Mr. Daubeny, and that Mr. Daubeny might help
Mr. Turnbull. It was now May,--the middle of May,--and ministers, who
had been at work on their Reform Bill ever since the beginning of the
session, were becoming weary of it. And then, should these odious
clauses escape the threatened Turnbull-Daubeny alliance,--then there
was the House of Lords! "What a pity we can't pass our bills at the
Treasury, and have done with them!" said Laurence Fitzgibbon. "Yes,
indeed," replied Mr. Ratler. "For myself, I was never so tired of a
session in my life. I wouldn't go through it again to be made,--no,
not to be made Chancellor of the Exchequer."
Lord Brentford's note to Phineas Finn was as follows:--
House of Lords, 16th May, 186--.
MY DEAR MR. FINN,
You are no doubt aware that Lord Bosanquet's death has
taken Mr. Mottram into the Upper House, and that as
he was Under-Secretary for the Colonies, and as the
Under-Secretary must be in the Lower House, the vacancy
must be filled up.
The heart of Phineas Finn at this moment was almost in his mouth. Not
only to be selected for political employment, but to be selected at
once for an office so singularly desirable! Under-Secretaries, he
fancied, were paid two thousand a year. What would Mr. Low say now?
But his great triumph soon received a check. "Mr. Mildmay has spoken
to me on the subject," continued the letter, "and informs me that
he has offered the place at the colonies to his old supporter, Mr.
Laurence Fitzgibbon." Laurence Fitzgibbon!
I am inclined to think that he could not have done better,
as Mr. Fitzgibbon has shown great zeal for his party. This
will vacate the Irish seat at the Treasury Board, and I am
commissioned by Mr. Mildmay to offer it to you. Perhaps
you will do me the pleasure of calling on me to-morrow
between the hours of eleven and twelve.
Yours very sincerely,
BRENTFORD.
Phineas was himself surprised to find that his first feeling on
reading this letter was one of dissatisfaction. Here were his golden
hopes about to be realised,--hopes as to the realisation of which
he had been quite despondent twelve months ago,--and yet he was
uncomfortable because he was to be postponed to Laurence Fitzgibbon.
Had the new Under-Secretary been a man whom he had not known, whom he
had not learned to look down upon as inferior to himself, he would
not have minded it,--would have been full of joy at the promotion
proposed for himself. But Laurence Fitzgibbon was such a poor
creature, that the idea of filling a place from which Laurence had
risen was distasteful to him. "It seems to be all a matter of favour
and convenience," he said to himself, "without any reference to the
service." His triumph would have been so complete had Mr. Mildmay
allowed him to go into the higher place at one leap. Other men who
had made themselves useful had done so. In the first hour after
receiving Lord Brentford's letter, the idea of becoming a Lord of the
Treasury was almost displeasing to him. He had an idea that junior
lordships of the Treasury were generally bestowed on young members
whom it was convenient to secure, but who were not good at doing
anything. There was a moment in which he thought that he would refuse
to be made a junior lord.
But during the night cooler reflections told him that he had been
very wrong. He had taken up politics with the express desire of
getting his foot upon a rung of the ladder of promotion, and now, in
his third session, he was about to be successful. Even as a junior
lord he would have a thousand a year; and how long might he have sat
in chambers, and have wandered about Lincoln's Inn, and have loitered
in the courts striving to look as though he had business, before he
would have earned a thousand a year! Even as a junior lord he could
make himself useful, and when once he should be known to be a good
working man, promotion would come to him. No ladder can be mounted
without labour; but this ladder was now open above his head, and he
already had his foot upon it.
At half-past eleven he was with Lord Brentford, who received him
with the blandest smile and a pressure of the hand which was quite
cordial. "My dear Finn," he said, "this gives me the most sincere
pleasure,--the greatest pleasure in the world. Our connection
together at Loughton of course makes it doubly agreeable to me."
"I cannot be too grateful to you, Lord Brentford."
"No, no; no, no. It is all your own doing. When Mr. Mildmay asked
me whether I did not think you the most promising of the young
members on our side in your House, I certainly did say that I quite
concurred. But I should be taking too much on myself, I should be
acting dishonestly, if I were to allow you to imagine that it was my
proposition. Had he asked me to recommend, I should have named you;
that I say frankly. But he did not. He did not. Mr. Mildmay named you
himself. 'Do you think,' he said, 'that your friend Finn would join
us at the Treasury?' I told him that I did think so. 'And do you not
think,' said he, 'that it would be a useful appointment?' Then I
ventured to say that I had no doubt whatever on that point;--that I
knew you well enough to feel confident that you would lend a strength
to the Liberal Government. Then there were a few words said about
your seat, and I was commissioned to write to you. That was all."
Phineas was grateful, but not too grateful, and bore himself very
well in the interview. He explained to Lord Brentford that of course
it was his object to serve the country,--and to be paid for his
services,--and that he considered himself to be very fortunate to be
selected so early in his career for parliamentary place. He would
endeavour to do his duty, and could safely say of himself that he did
not wish to eat the bread of idleness. As he made this assertion, he
thought of Laurence Fitzgibbon. Laurence Fitzgibbon had eaten the
bread of idleness, and yet he was promoted. But Phineas said nothing
to Lord Brentford about his idle friend. When he had made his little
speech he asked a question about the borough.
"I have already ventured to write a letter to my agent at Loughton,
telling him that you have accepted office, and that you will be
shortly there again. He will see Shortribs and arrange it. But if I
were you I should write to Shortribs and to Grating,--after I had
seen Mr. Mildmay. Of course you will not mention my name," And the
Earl looked very grave as he uttered this caution.
"Of course I will not," said Phineas.
"I do not think you'll find any difficulty about the seat," said the
peer. "There never has been any difficulty at Loughton yet. I must
say that for them. And if we can scrape through with Clause 72 we
shall be all right;--shall we not?" This was the clause as to which
so violent an opposition was expected from Mr. Turnbull,--a clause as
to which Phineas himself had felt that he would hardly know how to
support the Government, in the event of the committee being pressed
to a division upon it. Could he, an ardent reformer, a reformer
at heart,--could he say that such a borough as Loughton should be
spared;--that the arrangement by which Shortribs and Grating had sent
him to Parliament, in obedience to Lord Brentford's orders, was in
due accord with the theory of a representative legislature? In what
respect had Gatton and Old Sarum been worse than Loughton? Was he
not himself false to his principle in sitting for such a borough
as Loughton? He had spoken to Mr. Monk, and Mr. Monk had told him
that Rome was not built in a day,--and had told him also that good
things were most valued and were more valuable when they came by
instalments. But then Mr. Monk himself enjoyed the satisfaction of
sitting for a popular Constituency. He was not personally pricked
in the conscience by his own parliamentary position. Now, however,
--now that Phineas had consented to join the Government, any such
considerations as these must be laid aside. He could no longer be a
free agent, or even a free thinker. He had been quite aware of this,
and had taught himself to understand that members of Parliament in
the direct service of the Government were absolved from the necessity
of free-thinking. Individual free-thinking was incompatible with the
position of a member of the Government, and unless such abnegation
were practised, no government would be possible. It was of course a
man's duty to bind himself together with no other men but those with
whom, on matters of general policy, he could agree heartily;--but
having found that he could so agree, he knew that it would be his
duty as a subaltern to vote as he was directed. It would trouble his
conscience less to sit for Loughton and vote for an objectionable
clause as a member of the Government, than it would have done to give
such a vote as an independent member. In so resolving, he thought
that he was simply acting in accordance with the acknowledged rules
of parliamentary government. And therefore, when Lord Brentford spoke
of Clause 72, he could answer pleasantly, "I think we shall carry
it; and, you see, in getting it through committee, if we can carry
it by one, that is as good as a hundred. That's the comfort of
close-fighting in committee. In the open House we are almost as much
beaten by a narrow majority as by a vote against us."
"Just so; just so," said Lord Brentford, delighted to see that his
young pupil,--as he regarded him,--understood so well the system of
parliamentary management. "By-the-bye, Finn, have you seen Chiltern
lately?"
"Not quite lately," said Phineas, blushing up to his eyes.
"Or heard from him?"
"No;--nor heard from him. When last I heard of him he was in
Brussels."
"Ah,--yes; he is somewhere on the Rhine now. I thought that as you
were so intimate, perhaps you corresponded with him. Have you heard
that we have arranged about Lady Laura's money?"
"I have heard. Lady Laura has told me."
"I wish he would return," said Lord Brentford sadly,--almost
solemnly. "As that great difficulty is over, I would receive him
willingly, and make my house pleasant to him, if I can do so. I am
most anxious that he should settle, and marry. Could you not write
to him?" Phineas, not daring to tell Lord Brentford that he had
quarrelled with Lord Chiltern,--feeling that if he did so everything
would go wrong,--said that he would write to Lord Chiltern.
As he went away he felt that he was bound to get an answer from
Violet Effingham. If it should be necessary, he was willing to break
with Lord Brentford on that matter,--even though such breaking should
lose him his borough and his place;--but not on any other matter.
CHAPTER XLIV
Phineas and His Friends
Our hero's friends were, I think, almost more elated by our hero's
promotion than was our hero himself. He never told himself that it
was a great thing to be a junior lord of the Treasury, though he
acknowledged to himself that to have made a successful beginning
was a very great thing. But his friends were loud in their
congratulations,--or condolements as the case might be.
He had his interview with Mr. Mildmay, and, after that, one of
his first steps was to inform Mrs. Bunce that he must change his
lodgings. "The truth is, Mrs. Bunce, not that I want anything better;
but that a better position will be advantageous to me, and that I
can afford to pay for it." Mrs. Bunce acknowledged the truth of the
argument, with her apron up to her eyes. "I've got to be so fond of
looking after you, Mr. Finn! I have indeed," said Mrs. Bunce. "It is
not just what you pays like, because another party will pay as much.
But we've got so used to you, Mr. Finn,--haven't we?" Mrs. Bunce was
probably not aware herself that the comeliness of her lodger had
pleased her feminine eye, and touched her feminine heart. Had anybody
said that Mrs. Bunce was in love with Phineas, the scandal would have
been monstrous. And yet it was so,--after a fashion. And Bunce knew
it,--after his fashion. "Don't be such an old fool," he said, "crying
after him because he's six foot high." "I ain't crying after him
because he's six foot high," whined the poor woman;--"but one does
like old faces better than new, and a gentleman about one's place
is pleasant." "Gentleman be d----d," said Bunce. But his anger was
excited, not by his wife's love for Phineas, but by the use of an
objectionable word.
Bunce himself had been on very friendly terms with Phineas, and they
two had had many discussions on matters of politics, Bunce taking
up the cudgels always for Mr. Turnbull, and generally slipping away
gradually into some account of his own martyrdom. For he had been a
martyr, having failed in obtaining any redress against the policeman
who had imprisoned him so wrongfully. The _People's Banner_
had fought for him manfully, and therefore there was a little
disagreement between him and Phineas on the subject of that great
organ of public opinion. And as Mr. Bunce thought that his lodger
was very wrong to sit for Lord Brentford's borough, subjects were
sometimes touched which were a little galling to Phineas.
Touching this promotion, Bunce had nothing but condolement to offer
to the new junior lord. "Oh yes," said he, in answer to an argument
from Phineas, "I suppose there must be lords, as you call 'em; though
for the matter of that I can't see as they is of any mortal use."
"Wouldn't you have the Government carried on?"
"Government! Well; I suppose there must be government. But the less
of it the better. I'm not against government;--nor yet against laws,
Mr. Finn; though the less of them, too, the better. But what does
these lords do in the Government? Lords indeed! I'll tell you what
they do, Mr. Finn. They wotes; that's what they do! They wotes hard;
black or white, white or black. Ain't that true? When you're a
'lord,' will you be able to wote against Mr. Mildmay to save your
very soul?"
"If it comes to be a question of soul-saving, Mr. Bunce, I shan't
save my place at the expense of my conscience."
"Not if you knows it, you mean. But the worst of it is that a man
gets so thick into the mud that he don't know whether he's dirty or
clean. You'll have to wote as you're told, and of course you'll think
it's right enough. Ain't you been among Parliament gents long enough
to know that that's the way it goes?"
"You think no honest man can be a member of the Government?"
"I don't say that, but I think honesty's a deal easier away from 'em.
The fact is, Mr. Finn, it's all wrong with us yet, and will be till
we get it nigher to the great American model. If a poor man gets into
Parliament,--you'll excuse me, Mr. Finn, but I calls you a poor man."
"Certainly,--as a member of Parliament I am a very poor man."
"Just so,--and therefore what do you do? You goes and lays yourself
out for government! I'm not saying as how you're anyways wrong. A man
has to live. You has winning ways, and a good physiognomy of your
own, and are as big as a life-guardsman." Phineas as he heard this
doubtful praise laughed and blushed. "Very well; you makes your
way with the big wigs, lords and earls and them like, and you gets
returned for a rotten borough;--you'll excuse me, but that's about
it, ain't it?--and then you goes in for government! A man may have
a mission to govern, such as Washington and Cromwell and the like
o' them. But when I hears of Mr. Fitzgibbon a-governing, why then I
says,--d----n it all."
"There must be good and bad you know."
"We've got to change a deal yet, Mr. Finn, and we'll do it. When a
young man as has liberal feelings gets into Parliament, he shouldn't
be snapped up and brought into the governing business just because
he's poor and wants a salary. They don't do it that way in the
States; and they won't do it that way here long. It's the system as I
hates, and not you, Mr. Finn. Well, good-bye, sir. I hope you'll like
the governing business, and find it suits your health."
These condolements from Mr. Bunce were not pleasant, but they set
him thinking. He felt assured that Bunce and Quintus Slide and Mr.
Turnbull were wrong. Bunce was ignorant. Quintus Slide was dishonest.
Turnbull was greedy of popularity. For himself, he thought that as a
young man he was fairly well informed. He knew that he meant to be
true in his vocation. And he was quite sure that the object nearest
to his heart in politics was not self-aggrandisement, but the welfare
of the people in general. And yet he could not but agree with Bunce
that there was something wrong. When such men as Laurence Fitzgibbon
were called upon to act as governors, was it not to be expected
that the ignorant but still intelligent Bunces of the population
should--"d----n it all"?
On the evening of that day he went up to Mrs. Low's, very sure that
he should receive some encouragement from her and from her husband.
She had been angry with him because he had put himself into a
position in which money must be spent and none could be made. The
Lows, especially Mrs. Low, had refused to believe that any success
was within his reach. Now that he had succeeded, now that he was in
receipt of a salary on which he could live and save money, he would
be sure of sympathy from his old friends the Lows!
But Mrs. Low was as severe upon him as Mr. Bunce had been, and
even from Mr. Low he could extract no real comfort. "Of course I
congratulate you," said Mr. Low coldly.
"And you, Mrs. Low?"
"Well, you know, Mr. Finn, I think you have begun at the wrong end. I
thought so before, and I think so still. I suppose I ought not to say
so to a Lord of the Treasury, but if you ask me, what can I do?"
"Speak the truth out, of course."
"Exactly. That's what I must do. Well, the truth is, Mr. Finn, that
I do not think it is a very good opening for a young man to be made
what they call a Lord of the Treasury,--unless he has got a private
fortune, you know, to support that kind of life."
"You see, Phineas, a ministry is such an uncertain thing," said Mr.
Low.
"Of course it's uncertain;--but as I did go into the House, it's
something to have succeeded."
"If you call that success," said Mrs. Low.
"You did intend to go on with your profession," said Mr. Low. He
could not tell them that he had changed his mind, and that he meant
to marry Violet Effingham, who would much prefer a parliamentary life
for her husband to that of a working barrister. "I suppose that is
all given up now," continued Mr. Low.
"Just for the present," said Phineas.
"Yes;--and for ever I fear," said Mrs. Low, "You'll never go back to
real work after frittering away your time as a Lord of the Treasury.
What sort of work must it be when just anybody can do it that it
suits them to lay hold of? But of course a thousand a year is
something, though a man may have it for only six months."
It came out in the course of the evening that Mr. Low was going
to stand for the borough vacated by Mr. Mottram, at which it was
considered that the Conservatives might possibly prevail. "You see,
after all, Phineas," said Mr. Low, "that I am following your steps."
"Ah; you are going into the House in the course of your profession."
"Just so," said Mrs. Low.
"And are taking the first step towards being a Tory
Attorney-General."
"That's as may be," said Mr. Low. "But it's the kind of thing a man
does after twenty years of hard work. For myself, I really don't
care much whether I succeed or fail. I should like to live to be a
Vice-Chancellor. I don't mind saying as much as that to you. But I'm
not at all sure that Parliament is the best way to the Equity Bench."
"But it is a grand thing to get into Parliament when you do it by
means of your profession," said Mrs. Low.
Soon after that Phineas took his departure from the house, feeling
sore and unhappy. But on the next morning he was received in
Grosvenor Place with an amount of triumph which went far to
compensate him. Lady Laura had written to him to call there, and on
his arrival he found both Violet Effingham and Madame Max Goesler
with his friend. When Phineas entered the room his first feeling was
one of intense joy at seeing that Violet Effingham was present there.
Then there was one of surprise that Madame Max Goesler should make
one of the little party. Lady Laura had told him at Mr. Palliser's
dinner-party that they, in Portman Square, had not as yet advanced
far enough to receive Madame Max Goesler,--and yet here was the lady
in Mr. Kennedy's drawing-room. Now Phineas would have thought it more
likely that he should find her in Portman Square than in Grosvenor
Place. The truth was that Madame Goesler had been brought by Miss
Effingham,--with the consent, indeed, of Lady Laura, but with a
consent given with much of hesitation. "What are you afraid of?"
Violet had asked. "I am afraid of nothing," Lady Laura had answered;
"but one has to choose one's acquaintance in accordance with rules
which one doesn't lay down very strictly." "She is a clever woman,"
said Violet, "and everybody likes her; but if you think Mr. Kennedy
would object, of course you are right." Then Lady Laura had
consented, telling herself that it was not necessary that she should
ask her husband's approval as to every new acquaintance she might
form. At the same time Violet had been told that Phineas would be
there, and so the party had been made up.
"'See the conquering hero comes,' said Violet in her cheeriest voice.
"I am so glad that Mr. Finn has been made a lord of something,"
said Madame Max Goesler. "I had the pleasure of a long political
discussion with him the other night, and I quite approve of him."
"We are so much gratified, Mr. Finn," said Lady Laura. "Mr. Kennedy
says that it is the best appointment they could have made, and papa
is quite proud about it."
"You are Lord Brentford's member; are you not?" asked Madame Max
Goesler. This was a question which Phineas did not quite like, and
which he was obliged to excuse by remembering that the questioner had
lived so long out of England as to be probably ignorant of the myths,
and theories, and system, and working of the British Constitution.
Violet Effingham, little as she knew of politics, would never have
asked a question so imprudent.
But the question was turned off, and Phineas, with an easy grace,
submitted himself to be petted, and congratulated, and purred
over, and almost caressed by the three ladies, Their good-natured
enthusiasm was at any rate better than the satire of Bunce, or the
wisdom of Mrs. Low. Lady Laura had no misgivings as to Phineas being
fit for governing, and Violet Effingham said nothing as to the
short-lived tenure of ministers. Madame Max Goesler, though she had
asked an indiscreet question, thoroughly appreciated the advantage
of Government pay, and the prestige of Government power. "You are a
lord now," she said, speaking, as was customary with her, with the
slightest possible foreign accent, "and you will be a president soon,
and then perhaps a secretary. The order of promotion seems odd, but I
am told it is very pleasant."
"It is pleasant to succeed, of course," said Phineas, "let the
success be ever so little."
"We knew you would succeed," said Lady Laura. "We were quite sure of
it. Were we not, Violet?"
"You always said so, my dear. For myself I do not venture to have
an opinion on such matters. Will you always have to go to that big
building in the corner, Mr. Finn, and stay there from ten till four?
Won't that be a bore?"
"We have a half-holiday on Saturday, you know," said Phineas.
"And do the Lords of the Treasury have to take care of the money?"
asked Madame Max Goesler.
"Only their own; and they generally fail in doing that," said
Phineas.
He sat there for a considerable time, wondering whether Mr. Kennedy
would come in, and wondering also as to what Mr. Kennedy would say to
Madame Max Goesler when he did come in. He knew that it was useless
for him to expect any opportunity, then or there, of being alone for
a moment with Violet Effingham. His only chance in that direction
would be in some crowded room, at some ball at which he might ask her
to dance with him; but it seemed that fate was very unkind to him,
and that no such chance came in his way. Mr. Kennedy did not appear,
and Madame Max Goesler with Violet went away, leaving Phineas still
sitting with Lady Laura. Each of them said a kind word to him as
they went. "I don't know whether I may dare to expect that a Lord of
the Treasury will come and see me?" said Madame Max Goesler. Then
Phineas made a second promise that he would call in Park Lane. Violet
blushed as she remembered that she could not ask him to call at Lady
Baldock's. "Good-bye, Mr. Finn," she said, giving him her hand.
"I'm so very glad that they have chosen you; and I do hope that, as
Madame Max says, they'll make you a secretary and a president, and
everything else very quickly,--till it will come to your turn to
be making other people." "He is very nice," said Madame Goesler to
Violet as she took her place in the carriage. "He bears being petted
and spoilt without being either awkward or conceited." "On the whole,
he is rather nice," said Violet; "only he has not got a shilling in
the world, and has to make himself before he will be anybody." "He
must marry money, of course," said Madame Max Goesler.
"I hope you are contented?" said Lady Laura, rising from her chair
and coming opposite to him as soon as they were alone.
"Of course I am contented."
"I was not,--when I first heard of it. Why did they promote that
empty-headed countryman of yours to a place for which he was quite
unfit? I was not contented. But then I am more ambitious for you than
you are for yourself." He sat without answering her for awhile, and
she stood waiting for his reply. "Have you nothing to say to me?" she
asked.
"I do not know what to say. When I think of it all, I am lost in
amazement. You tell me that you are not contented;--that you are
ambitious for me. Why is it that you should feel any interest in the
matter?"
"Is it not reasonable that we should be interested for our friends?"
"But when you and I last parted here in this room you were hardly my
friend."
"Was I not? You wrong me there;--very deeply."
"I told you what was my ambition, and you resented it," said Phineas.
"I think I said that I could not help you, and I think I said also
that I thought you would fail. I do not know that I showed much
resentment. You see, I told her that you were here, that she might
come and meet you. You know that I wished my brother should succeed.
I wished it before I ever knew you. You cannot expect that I should
change my wishes."
"But if he cannot succeed," pleaded Phineas.
"Who is to say that? Has a woman never been won by devotion and
perseverance? Besides, how can I wish to see you go on with a suit
which must sever you from my father, and injure your political
prospects;--perhaps fatally injure them? It seems to me now that my
father is almost the only man in London who has not heard of this
duel."
"Of course he will hear of it. I have half made up my mind to tell
him myself."
"Do not do that, Mr. Finn. There can be no reason for it. But I
did not ask you to come here to-day to talk to you about Oswald or
Violet. I have given you my advice about that, and I can do no more."
"Lady Laura, I cannot take it. It is out of my power to take it."
"Very well. The matter shall be what you members of Parliament call
an open question between us. When papa asked you to accept this place
at the Treasury, did it ever occur to you to refuse it?"
"It did;--for half an hour or so."
"I hoped you would,--and yet I knew that I was wrong. I thought that
you should count yourself to be worth more than that, and that you
should, as it were, assert yourself. But then it is so difficult
to draw the line between proper self-assertion and proper
self-denial;--to know how high to go up the table, and how low to
go down. I do not doubt that you have been right,--only make them
understand that you are not as other junior lords;--that you have
been willing to be a junior lord, or anything else for a purpose;
but that the purpose is something higher than that of fetching and
carrying in Parliament for Mr. Mildmay and Mr. Palliser."
"I hope in time to get beyond fetching and carrying," said Phineas.
"Of course you will; and knowing that, I am glad that you are in
office. I suppose there will be no difficulty about Loughton."
Then Phineas laughed. "I hear," said he, "that Mr. Quintus Slide,
of the _People's Banner_, has already gone down to canvass the
electors."
"Mr. Quintus Slide! To canvass the electors of Loughton!" and Lady
Laura drew herself up and spoke of this unseemly intrusion on her
father's borough, as though the vulgar man who had been named had
forced his way into the very drawing-room in Portman Square. At that
moment Mr. Kennedy came in. "Do you hear what Mr. Finn tells me?" she
said. "He has heard that Mr. Quintus Slide has gone down to Loughton
to stand against him."
"And why not?" said Mr. Kennedy.
"My dear!" ejaculated Lady Laura.
"Mr. Quintus Slide will no doubt lose his time and his money;--but he
will gain the prestige of having stood for a borough, which will be
something for him on the staff of the _People's Banner_," said Mr.
Kennedy.
"He will get that horrid man Vellum to propose him," said Lady Laura.
"Very likely," said Mr. Kennedy. "And the less any of us say about
it the better. Finn, my dear fellow, I congratulate you heartily.
Nothing for a long time has given me greater pleasure than hearing
of your appointment. It is equally honourable to yourself and to Mr.
Mildmay. It is a great step to have gained so early."
Phineas, as he thanked his friend, could not help asking himself what
his friend had done to be made a Cabinet Minister. Little as he,
Phineas, himself had done in the House in his two sessions and a
half, Mr. Kennedy had hardly done more in his fifteen or twenty. But
then Mr. Kennedy was possessed of almost miraculous wealth, and owned
half a county, whereas he, Phineas, owned almost nothing at all.
Of course no Prime Minister would offer a junior lordship at the
Treasury to a man with £30,000 a year. Soon after this Phineas took
his leave. "I think he will do well," said Mr. Kennedy to his wife.
"I am sure he will do well," replied Lady Laura, almost scornfully.
"He is not quite such a black swan with me as he is with you; but
still I think he will succeed, if he takes care of himself. It is
astonishing how that absurd story of his duel with Chiltern has got
about."
"It is impossible to prevent people talking," said Lady Laura.
"I suppose there was some quarrel, though neither of them will tell
you. They say it was about Miss Effingham. I should hardly think that
Finn could have any hopes in that direction."
"Why should he not have hopes?"
"Because he has neither position, nor money, nor birth," said Mr.
Kennedy.
"He is a gentleman." said Lady Laura; "and I think he has position. I
do not see why he should not ask any girl to marry him."
"There is no understanding you, Laura," said Mr. Kennedy, angrily. "I
thought you had quite other hopes about Miss Effingham."
"So I have; but that has nothing to do with it. You spoke of Mr. Finn
as though he would be guilty of some crime were he to ask Violet
Effingham to be his wife. In that I disagree with you. Mr. Finn is--"
"You will make me sick of the name of Mr. Finn."
"I am sorry that I offend you by my gratitude to a man who saved your
life." Mr. Kennedy shook his head. He knew that the argument used
against him was false, but he did not know how to show that he knew
that it was false. "Perhaps I had better not mention his name any
more," continued Lady Laura.
"Nonsense!"
"I quite agree with you that it is nonsense, Robert."
"All I mean to say is, that if you go on as you do, you will turn his
head and spoil him. Do you think I do not know what is going on among
you?"
"And what is going on among us,--as you call it?"
"You are taking this young man up and putting him on a pedestal and
worshipping him, just because he is well-looking, and rather clever
and decently behaved. It's always the way with women who have nothing
to do, and who cannot be made to understand that they should have
duties. They cannot live without some kind of idolatry."
"Have I neglected my duty to you, Robert?"
"Yes,--you know you have;--in going to those receptions at your
father's house on Sundays."
"What has that to do with Mr. Finn?"
"Psha!"
"I begin to think I had better tell Mr. Finn not to come here any
more, since his presence is disagreeable to you. All the world knows
how great is the service he did you, and it will seem to be very
ridiculous. People will say all manner of things; but anything will
be better than that you should go on as you have done,--accusing your
wife of idolatry towards--a young man, because--he is--well-looking."
"I never said anything of the kind."
"You did, Robert."
"I did not. I did not speak more of you than of a lot of others."
"You accused me personally, saying that because of my idolatry I had
neglected my duty; but really you made such a jumble of it all, with
papa's visitors, and Sunday afternoons, that I cannot follow what was
in your mind."
Then Mr. Kennedy stood for awhile, collecting his thoughts, so that
he might unravel the jumble, if that were possible to him; but
finding that it was not possible, he left the room, and closed the
door behind him.
Then Lady Laura was left alone to consider the nature of the
accusation which her husband had brought against her; or the nature
rather of the accusation which she had chosen to assert that her
husband had implied. For in her heart she knew that he had made no
such accusation, and had intended to make none such. The idolatry of
which he had spoken was the idolatry which a woman might show to her
cat, her dog, her picture, her china, her furniture, her carriage and
horses, or her pet maid-servant. Such was the idolatry of which Mr.
Kennedy had spoken;--but was there no other worship in her heart,
worse, more pernicious than that, in reference to this young man?
She had schooled herself about him very severely, and had come to
various resolutions. She had found out and confessed to herself that
she did not, and could not, love her husband. She had found out and
confessed to herself that she did love, and could not help loving,
Phineas Finn. Then she had resolved to banish him from her presence,
and had gone the length of telling him so. After that she had
perceived that she had been wrong, and had determined to meet him as
she met other men,--and to conquer her love. Then, when this could
not be done, when something almost like idolatry grew upon her, she
determined that it should be the idolatry of friendship, that she
would not sin even in thought, that there should be nothing in her
heart of which she need be ashamed;--but that the one great object
and purport of her life should be the promotion of this friend's
welfare. She had just begun to love after this fashion, had taught
herself to believe that she might combine something of the pleasure
of idolatry towards her friend with a full complement of duty towards
her husband, when Phineas came to her with his tale of love for
Violet Effingham. The lesson which she got then was a very rough
one,--so hard that at first she could not bear it. Her anger at his
love for her brother's wished-for bride was lost in her dismay that
Phineas should love any one after having once loved her. But by
sheer force of mind she had conquered that dismay, that feeling of
desolation at her heart, and had almost taught herself to hope that
Phineas might succeed with Violet. He wished it,--and why should he
not have what he wished,--he, whom she so fondly idolised? It was not
his fault that he and she were not man and wife. She had chosen to
arrange it otherwise, and was she not bound to assist him now in the
present object of his reasonable wishes? She had got over in her
heart that difficulty about her brother, but she could not quite
conquer the other difficulty. She could not bring herself to plead
his cause with Violet. She had not brought herself as yet to do it.
And now she was accused of idolatry for Phineas by her husband,--she
with "a lot of others," in which lot Violet was of course included.
Would it not be better that they two should be brought together?
Would not her friend's husband still be her friend? Would she not
then forget to love him? Would she not then be safer than she was
now?
As she sat alone struggling with her difficulties, she had not as yet
forgotten to love him,--nor was she as yet safe.
CHAPTER XLV
Miss Effingham's Four Lovers
One morning early in June Lady Laura called at Lady Baldock's house
and asked for Miss Effingham. The servant was showing her into
the large drawing-room, when she again asked specially for Miss
Effingham. "I think Miss Effingham is there," said the man, opening
the door. Miss Effingham was not there. Lady Baldock was sitting
all alone, and Lady Laura perceived that she had been caught in
the net which she specially wished to avoid. Now Lady Baldock had
not actually or openly quarrelled with Lady Laura Kennedy or with
Lord Brentford, but she had conceived a strong idea that her niece
Violet was countenanced in all improprieties by the Standish family
generally, and that therefore the Standish family was to be regarded
as a family of enemies. There was doubtless in her mind considerable
confusion on the subject, for she did not know whether Lord Chiltern
or Mr. Finn was the suitor whom she most feared,--and she was aware,
after a sort of muddled fashion, that the claims of these two wicked
young men were antagonistic to each other. But they were both
regarded by her as emanations from the same source of iniquity,
and, therefore, without going deeply into the machinations of Lady
Laura,--without resolving whether Lady Laura was injuring her by
pressing her brother as a suitor upon Miss Effingham, or by pressing
a rival of her brother,--still she became aware that it was her duty
to turn a cold shoulder on those two houses in Portman Square and
Grosvenor Place. But her difficulties in doing this were very great,
and it may be said that Lady Baldock was placed in an unjust and
cruel position. Before the end of May she had proposed to leave
London, and to take her daughter and Violet down to Baddingham,--or
to Brighton, if they preferred it, or to Switzerland. "Brighton in
June!" Violet had exclaimed. "Would not a month among the glaciers be
delightful!" Miss Boreham had said. "Don't let me keep you in town,
aunt," Violet replied; "but I do not think I shall go till other
people go. I can have a room at Laura Kennedy's house." Then Lady
Baldock, whose position was hard and cruel, resolved that she would
stay in town. Here she had in her hands a ward over whom she had no
positive power, and yet in respect to whom her duty was imperative!
Her duty was imperative, and Lady Baldock was not the woman to
neglect her duty;--and yet she knew that the doing of her duty would
all be in vain. Violet would marry a shoe-black out of the streets if
she were so minded. It was of no use that the poor lady had provided
herself with two strings, two most excellent strings, to her
bow,--two strings either one of which should have contented Miss
Effingham. There was Lord Fawn, a young peer, not very rich
indeed,--but still with means sufficient for a wife, a rising
man, and in every way respectable, although a Whig. And there
was Mr. Appledom, one of the richest commoners in England, a
fine Conservative too, with a seat in the House, and everything
appropriate. He was fifty, but looked hardly more than thirty-five,
and was,--so at least Lady Baldock frequently asserted,--violently in
love with Violet Effingham. Why had not the law, or the executors, or
the Lord Chancellor, or some power levied for the protection of the
proprieties, made Violet absolutely subject to her guardian till she
should be made subject to a husband?
"Yes, I think she is at home," said Lady Baldock, in answer to Lady
Laura's inquiry for Violet. "At least, I hardly know. She seldom
tells me what she means to do,--and sometimes she will walk out quite
alone!" A most imprudent old woman was Lady Baldock, always opening
her hand to her adversaries, unable to control herself in the
scolding of people, either before their faces or behind their backs,
even at moments in which such scolding was most injurious to her own
cause. "However, we will see," she continued. Then the bell was rung,
and in a few minutes Violet was in the room. In a few minutes more
they were up-stairs together in Violet's own room, in spite of the
openly-displayed wrath of Lady Baldock. "I almost wish she had never
been born," said Lady Baldock to her daughter. "Oh, mamma, don't
say that." "I certainly do wish that I had never seen her." "Indeed
she has been a grievous trouble to you, mamma," said Miss Boreham,
sympathetically.
"Brighton! What nonsense!" said Lady Laura.
"Of course it's nonsense. Fancy going to Brighton! And then they
have proposed Switzerland. If you could only hear Augusta talking in
rapture of a month among the glaciers! And I feel so ungrateful. I
believe they would spend three months with me at any horrible place
that I could suggest,--at Hong Kong if I were to ask it,--so intent
are they on taking me away from metropolitan danger."
"But you will not go?"
"No!--I won't go. I know I am very naughty; but I can't help feeling
that I cannot be good without being a fool at the same time. I must
either fight my aunt, or give way to her. If I were to yield, what a
life I should have;--and I should despise myself after all."
"And what is the special danger to be feared now?"
"I don't know;--you, I fancy. I told her that if she went, I should
go to you. I knew that would make her stay."
"I wish you would come to me," said Lady Laura.
"I shouldn't think of it really,--not for any length of time."
"Why not?"
"Because I should be in Mr. Kennedy's way."
"You wouldn't be in his way in the least. If you would only be down
punctually for morning prayers, and go to church with him on Sunday
afternoon, he would be delighted to have you."
"What did he say about Madame Max coming?"
"Not a word. I don't think he quite knew who she was then. I fancy he
has inquired since, by something he said yesterday."
"What did he say?"
"Nothing that matters;--only a word. I haven't come here to talk
about Madame Max Goesler,--nor yet about Mr. Kennedy."
"Whom have you come to talk about?" asked Violet, laughing a little,
with something of increased colour in her cheeks, though she could
not be said to blush.
"A lover of course," said Lady Laura.
"I wish you would leave me alone with my lovers. You are as bad or
worse than my aunt. She, at any rate, varies her prescription. She
has become sick of poor Lord Fawn because he's a Whig."
"And who is her favourite now?"
"Old Mr. Appledom,--who is really a most unexceptionable old party,
and whom I like of all things. I really think I could consent to be
Mrs. Appledom, to get rid of my troubles,--if he did not dye his
whiskers and have his coats padded."
"He'd give up those little things if you asked him."
"I shouldn't have the heart to do it. Besides, this isn't his time of
the year for making proposals. His love fever, which is of a very low
kind, and intermits annually, never comes on till the autumn. It is a
rural malady, against which he is proof while among his clubs!"
"Well, Violet,--I am like your aunt."
"Like Lady Baldock?"
"In one respect. I, too, will vary my prescription."
"What do you mean, Laura?"
"Just this,--that if you like to marry Phineas Finn, I will say that
you are right."
"Heaven and earth! And why am I to marry Phineas Finn?"
"Only for two reasons; because he loves you, and because--"
"No,--I deny it. I do not."
"I had come to fancy that you did."
"Keep your fancy more under control then. But upon my word I can't
understand this. He was your great friend."
"What has that to do with it?" demanded Lady Laura.
"And you have thrown over your brother, Laura?"
"You have thrown him over. Is he to go on for ever asking and being
refused?"
"I do not know why he should not," said Violet, "seeing how very
little trouble it gives him. Half an hour once in six months does it
all for him, allowing him time for coming and going in a cab."
"Violet, I do not understand you. Have you refused Oswald so often
because he does not pass hours on his knees before you?"
"No, indeed! His nature would be altered very much for the worse
before he could do that."
"Why do you throw it in his teeth then that he does not give you more
of his time?"
"Why have you come to tell me to marry Mr. Phineas Finn? That is what
I want to know. Mr. Phineas Finn, as far as I am aware, has not a
shilling in the world,--except a month's salary now due to him from
the Government. Mr. Phineas Finn I believe to be the son of a country
doctor in Ireland,--with about seven sisters. Mr. Phineas Finn is a
Roman Catholic. Mr. Phineas Finn is,--or was a short time ago,--in
love with another lady; and Mr. Phineas Finn is not so much in
love at this moment but what he is able to intrust his cause to an
ambassador. None short of a royal suitor should ever do that with
success."
"Has he never pleaded his cause to you himself?"
"My dear, I never tell gentlemen's secrets. It seems that if he has,
his success was so trifling that he has thought he had better trust
some one else for the future."
"He has not trusted me. He has not given me any commission."
"Then why have you come?"
"Because,--I hardly know how to tell his story. There have been
things about Oswald which made it almost necessary that Mr. Finn
should explain himself to me."
"I know it all;--about their fighting. Foolish young men! I am not
a bit obliged to either of them,--not a bit. Only fancy, if my aunt
knew it, what a life she would lead me! Gustavus knows all about it,
and I feel that I am living at his mercy. Why were they so
wrong-headed?"
"I cannot answer that,--though I know them well enough to be sure
that Chiltern was the one in fault."
"It is so odd that you should have thrown your brother over."
"I have not thrown my brother over. Will you accept Oswald if he asks
you again?"
"No," almost shouted Violet.
"Then I hope that Mr. Finn may succeed. I want him to succeed in
everything. There;--you may know it all. He is my Phoebus Apollo."
"That is flattering to me,--looking at the position in which you
desire to place your Phoebus at the present moment."
"Come, Violet, I am true to you, and let me have a little truth from
you. This man loves you, and I think is worthy of you. He does not
love me, but he is my friend. As his friend, and believing in his
worth, I wish for his success beyond almost anything else in the
world. Listen to me, Violet. I don't believe in those reasons which
you gave me just now for not becoming this man's wife."
"Nor do I."
"I know you do not. Look at me. I, who have less of real heart than
you, I who thought that I could trust myself to satisfy my mind and
my ambition without caring for my heart, I have married for what you
call position. My husband is very rich, and a Cabinet Minister, and
will probably be a peer. And he was willing to marry me at a time
when I had not a shilling of my own."
"He was very generous."
"He has asked for it since," said Lady Laura. "But never mind. I have
not come to talk about myself;--otherwise than to bid you not do what
I have done. All that you have said about this man's want of money
and of family is nothing."
"Nothing at all," said Violet. "Mere words,--fit only for such people
as my aunt."
"Well then?"
"Well?"
"If you love him--!"
"Ah! but if I do not? You are very close in inquiring into my
secrets. Tell me, Laura;--was not this young Crichton once a lover of
your own?"
"Psha! And do you think I cannot keep a gentleman's secret as well as
you?"
"What is the good of any secret, Laura, when we have been already so
open? He tried his 'prentice hand on you; and then he came to me. Let
us watch him, and see who'll be the third. I too like him well enough
to hope that he'll land himself safely at last."
CHAPTER XLVI
The Mousetrap
Phineas had certainly no desire to make love by an ambassador,--at
second-hand. He had given no commission to Lady Laura, and was, as
the reader is aware, quite ignorant of what was being done and said
on his behalf. He had asked no more from Lady Laura than an
opportunity of speaking for himself, and that he had asked almost
with a conviction that by so asking he would turn his friend into an
enemy. He had read but little of the workings of Lady Laura's heart
towards himself, and had no idea of the assistance she was anxious to
give him. She had never told him that she was willing to sacrifice
her brother on his behalf, and, of course, had not told him that she
was willing also to sacrifice herself. Nor, when she wrote to him one
June morning and told him that Violet would be found in Portman
Square, alone, that afternoon,--naming an hour, and explaining that
Miss Effingham would be there to meet herself and her father, but
that at such an hour she would be certainly alone,--did he even then
know how much she was prepared to do for him. The short note was
signed "L.," and then there came a long postscript. "Ask for me," she
said in a postscript. "I shall be there later, and I have told them
to bid you wait. I can give you no hope of success, but if you choose
to try,--you can do so. If you do not come, I shall know that you
have changed your mind. I shall not think the worse of you, and your
secret will be safe with me. I do that which you have asked me to
do,--simply because you have asked it. Burn this at once,--because I
ask it." Phineas destroyed the note, tearing it into atoms, the
moment that he had read it and re-read it. Of course he would go to
Portman Square at the hour named. Of course he would take his chance.
He was not buoyed up by much of hope;--but even though there were no
hope, he would take his chance.
When Lord Brentford had first told Phineas of his promotion, he had
also asked the new Lord of the Treasury to make a certain
communication on his behalf to his son. This Phineas had found
himself obliged to promise to do;--and he had done it. The letter had
been difficult enough to write,--but he had written it. After having
made the promise, he had found himself bound to keep it.
"Dear Lord Chiltern," he had commenced, "I will not think that there
was anything in our late encounter to prevent my so addressing you. I
now write at the instance of your father, who has heard nothing of
our little affair." Then he explained at length Lord Brentford's
wishes as he understood them. "Pray come home," he said, finishing
his letter. "Touching V. E., I feel that I am bound to tell you that
I still mean to try my fortune, but that I have no ground for hoping
that my fortune will be good. Since the day on the sands, I have
never met her but in society. I know you will be glad to hear that my
wound was nothing; and I think you will be glad to hear that I have
got my foot on to the ladder of promotion.--Yours always,
"PHINEAS FINN."
Now he had to try his fortune,--that fortune of which he had told
Lord Chiltern that he had no reason for hoping that it would be good.
He went direct from his office at the Treasury to Portman Square,
resolving that he would take no trouble as to his dress, simply
washing his hands and brushing his hair as though he were going down
to the House, and he knocked at the Earl's door exactly at the hour
named by Lady Laura.
"Miss Effingham," he said, "I am so glad to find you alone."
"Yes," she said, laughing. "I am alone,--a poor unprotected female.
But I fear nothing. I have strong reason for believing that Lord
Brentford is somewhere about. And Pomfret the butler, who has known
me since I was a baby, is a host in himself."
"With such allies you can have nothing to fear," he replied,
attempting to carry on her little jest.
"Nor even without them, Mr. Finn. We unprotected females in these
days are so self-reliant that our natural protectors fall off from
us, finding themselves to be no longer wanted. Now with you,--what
can I fear?"
"Nothing,--as I hope."
"There used to be a time, and that not so long ago either, when young
gentlemen and ladies were thought to be very dangerous to each other
if they were left alone. But propriety is less rampant now, and upon
the whole virtue and morals, with discretion and all that kind of
thing, have been the gainers. Don't you think so?"
"I am sure of it."
"All the same, but I don't like to be caught in a trap, Mr. Finn."
"In a trap?"
"Yes;--in a trap. Is there no trap here? If you will say so, I will
acknowledge myself to be a dolt, and will beg your pardon."
"I hardly know what you call a trap."
"You were told that I was here?"
He paused a moment before he replied. "Yes, I was told."
"I call that a trap."
"Am I to blame?"
"I don't say that you set it,--but you use it."
"Miss Effingham, of course I have used it. You must know,--I think
you must know that I have that to say to you which has made me long
for such an opportunity as this."
"And therefore you have called in the assistance of your friend."
"It is true."
"In such matters you should never talk to any one, Mr. Finn. If you
cannot fight your own battle, no one can fight it for you."
"Miss Effingham, do you remember our ride at Saulsby?"
"Very well;--as if it were yesterday."
"And do you remember that I asked you a question which you have never
answered?"
"I did answer it,--as well as I knew how, so that I might tell you a
truth without hurting you."
"It was necessary,--is necessary that I should be hurt sorely, or
made perfectly happy. Violet Effingham, I have come to you to ask you
to be my wife;--to tell you that I love you, and to ask for your love
in return. Whatever may be my fate, the question must be asked, and
an answer must be given. I have not hoped that you should tell me
that you loved me--"
"For what then have you hoped?"
"For not much, indeed;--but if for anything, then for some chance
that you might tell me so hereafter."
"If I loved you, I would tell you so now,--instantly. I give you my
word of that."
"Can you never love me?"
"What is a woman to answer to such a question? No;--I believe never.
I do not think I shall ever wish you to be my husband. You ask me to
be plain, and I must be plain."
"Is it because--?" He paused, hardly knowing what the question was
which he proposed to himself to ask.
"It is for no because,--for no cause except that simple one which
should make any girl refuse any man whom she did not love. Mr.
Finn, I could say pleasant things to you on any other subject than
this,--because I like you."
"I know that I have nothing to justify my suit."
"You have everything to justify it;--at least I am bound to presume
that you have. If you love me,--you are justified."
"You know that I love you."
"I am sorry that it should ever have been so,--very sorry. I can only
hope that I have not been in fault."
"Will you try to love me?"
"No;--why should I try? If any trying were necessary, I would try
rather not to love you. Why should I try to do that which would
displease everybody belonging to me? For yourself, I admit your right
to address me,--and tell you frankly that it would not be in vain, if
I loved you. But I tell you as frankly that such a marriage would not
please those whom I am bound to try to please."
He paused a moment before he spoke further. "I shall wait," he said,
"and come again."
"What am I to say to that? Do not tease me, so that I be driven to
treat you with lack of courtesy. Lady Laura is so much attached to
you, and Mr. Kennedy, and Lord Brentford,--and indeed I may say,
I myself also, that I trust there may be nothing to mar our good
fellowship. Come, Mr. Finn,--say that you will take an answer, and
I will give you my hand."
"Give it me," said he. She gave him her hand, and he put it up to his
lips and pressed it. "I will wait and come again," he said. "I will
assuredly come again." Then he turned from her and went out of the
house. At the corner of the square he saw Lady Laura's carriage, but
did not stop to speak to her. And she also saw him.
"So you have had a visitor here," said Lady Laura to Violet.
"Yes;--I have been caught in the trap."
"Poor mouse! And has the cat made a meal of you?"
"I fancy he has, after his fashion. There be cats that eat their mice
without playing,--and cats that play with their mice, and then eat
them; and cats again which only play with their mice, and don't care
to eat them. Mr. Finn is a cat of the latter kind, and has had his
afternoon's diversion."
"You wrong him there."
"I think not, Laura. I do not mean to say that he would not have
liked me to accept him. But, if I can see inside his bosom, such a
little job as that he has now done will be looked back upon as one of
the past pleasures of his life;--not as a pain."
CHAPTER XLVII
Mr. Mildmay's Bill
It will be necessary that we should go back in our story for a very
short period in order that the reader may be told that Phineas Finn
was duly re-elected at Loughton after his appointment at the Treasury
Board. There was some little trouble at Loughton, and something
more of expense than he had before encountered. Mr. Quintus Slide
absolutely came down, and was proposed by Mr. Vellum for the borough.
Mr. Vellum being a gentleman learned in the law, and hostile to the
interests of the noble owner of Saulsby, was able to raise a little
trouble against our hero. Mr. Slide was proposed by Mr. Vellum, and
seconded by Mr. Vellum's clerk,--though, as it afterwards appeared,
Mr. Vellum's clerk was not in truth an elector,--and went to the poll
like a man. He received three votes, and at twelve o'clock withdrew.
This in itself could hardly have afforded compensation for the
expense which Mr. Slide or his backers must have encountered;--but
he had an opportunity of making a speech, every word of which was
reported in the _People's Banner_; and if the speech was made in the
language given in the report, Mr. Slide was really possessed of some
oratorical power. Most of those who read the speech in the columns
of the _People's Banner_ were probably not aware how favourable an
opportunity of retouching his sentences in type had been given to Mr.
Slide by the fact of his connection with the newspaper. The speech
had been very severe upon our hero; and though the speaker had
been so hooted and pelted at Loughton as to have been altogether
inaudible,--so maltreated that in point of fact he had not been able
to speak above a tenth part of his speech at all,--nevertheless the
speech did give Phineas a certain amount of pain. Why Phineas should
have read it who can tell? But who is there that abstains from
reading that which is printed in abuse of himself?
In the speech as it was printed Mr. Slide declared that he had no
thought of being returned for the borough. He knew too well how
the borough was managed, what slaves the electors were;--how they
groaned under a tyranny from which hitherto they had been unable
to release themselves. Of course the Earl's nominee, his lacquey,
as the honourable gentleman might be called, would be returned.
The Earl could order them to return whichever of his lacqueys he
pleased.--There is something peculiarly pleasing to the democratic
ear in the word lacquey! Any one serving a big man, whatever
the service may be, is the big man's lacquey in the _People's
Banner_.--The speech throughout was very bitter. Mr. Phineas Finn,
who had previously served in Parliament as the lacquey of an Irish
earl, and had been turned off by him, had now fallen into the service
of the English earl, and was the lacquey chosen for the present
occasion. But he, Quintus Slide, who boasted himself to be a man
of the people,--he could tell them that the days of their thraldom
were coming to an end, and that their enfranchisement was near at
hand. That friend of the people, Mr. Turnbull, had a clause in his
breeches-pocket which he would either force down the unwilling throat
of Mr. Mildmay, or else drive the imbecile Premier from office by
carrying it in his teeth. Loughton, as Loughton, must be destroyed,
but it should be born again in a better birth as a part of a
real electoral district, sending a real member, chosen by a real
constituency, to a real Parliament. In those days,--and they would
come soon,--Mr. Quintus Slide rather thought that Mr. Phineas Finn
would be found "nowhere," and he rather thought also that when he
showed himself again, as he certainly should do, in the midst of that
democratic electoral district as the popular candidate for the honour
of representing it in Parliament, that democratic electoral district
would accord to him a reception very different from that which he
was now receiving from the Earl's lacqueys in the parliamentary
village of Loughton. A prettier bit of fiction than these sentences
as composing a part of any speech delivered, or proposed to be
delivered, at Loughton, Phineas thought he had never seen. And when
he read at the close of the speech that though the Earl's hired
bullies did their worst, the remarks of Mr. Slide were received by
the people with reiterated cheering, he threw himself back in his
chair at the Treasury and roared. The poor fellow had been three
minutes on his legs, had received three rotten eggs, and one dead
dog, and had retired. But not the half of the speech as printed in
the _People's Banner_ has been quoted. The sins of Phineas, who in
spite of his inability to open his mouth in public had been made
a Treasury hack by the aristocratic influence,--"by aristocratic
influence not confined to the male sex,"--were described at great
length, and in such language that Phineas for a while was fool enough
to think that it would be his duty to belabour Mr. Slide with a
horsewhip. This notion, however, did not endure long with him, and
when Mr. Monk told him that things of that kind came as a matter of
course, he was comforted.
But he found it much more difficult to obtain comfort when he weighed
the arguments brought forward against the abominations of such a
borough as that for which he sat, and reflected that if Mr. Turnbull
brought forward his clause, he, Phineas Finn, would be bound to vote
against the clause, knowing the clause to be right, because he was a
servant of the Government. The arguments, even though they appeared
in the _People's Banner_, were true arguments; and he had on one
occasion admitted their truth to his friend Lady Laura,--in the
presence of that great Cabinet Minister, her husband. "What business
has such a man as that down there? Is there a single creature who
wants him?" Lady Laura had said. "I don't suppose anybody does want
Mr. Quintus Slide," Phineas had replied; "but I am disposed to think
the electors should choose the man they do want, and that at present
they have no choice left to them." "They are quite satisfied," said
Lady Laura, angrily. "Then, Lady Laura," continued Phineas, "that
alone should be sufficient to prove that their privilege of returning
a member to Parliament is too much for them. We can't defend it."
"It is defended by tradition," said Mr. Kennedy. "And by its great
utility," said Lady Laura, bowing to the young member who was
present, and forgetting that very useless old gentleman, her cousin,
who had sat for the borough for many years. "In this country it
doesn't do to go too fast," said Mr. Kennedy. "And then the mixture
of vulgarity, falsehood, and pretence!" said Lady Laura, shuddering
as her mind recurred to the fact that Mr. Quintus Slide had
contaminated Loughton by his presence. "I am told that they hardly
let him leave the place alive."
Whatever Mr. Kennedy and Lady Laura might think about Loughton
and the general question of small boroughs, it was found by the
Government, to their great cost, that Mr. Turnbull's clause was a
reality. After two months of hard work, all questions of franchise
had been settled, rating and renting, new and newfangled, fancy
franchises and those which no one fancied, franchises for boroughs
and franchises for counties, franchises single, dual, three-cornered,
and four-sided,--by various clauses to which the Committee of the
whole House had agreed after some score of divisions,--the matter
of the franchise had been settled. No doubt there was the House
of Lords, and there might yet be shipwreck. But it was generally
believed that the Lords would hardly look at the bill,--that they
would not even venture on an amendment. The Lords would only be too
happy to let the matter be settled by the Commons themselves. But
then, after the franchise, came redistribution. How sick of the
subject were all members of the Government, no one could tell who
did not see their weary faces. The whole House was sick, having been
whipped into various lobbies, night after night, during the heat of
the summer, for weeks past. Redistribution! Why should there be any
redistribution? They had got, or would get, a beautiful franchise.
Could they not see what that would do for them? Why redistribute
anything? But, alas, it was too late to go back to so blessed an idea
as that! Redistribution they must have. But there should be as little
redistribution as possible. Men were sick of it all, and would not be
exigeant. Something should be done for overgrown counties;--something
for new towns which had prospered in brick and mortar. It would
be easy to crush up a peccant borough or two,--a borough that had
been discovered in its sin. And a few boroughs now blessed with
two members might consent to be blessed only with one. Fifteen
small clauses might settle the redistribution, in spite of Mr.
Turnbull,--if only Mr. Daubeny would be good-natured.
Neither the weather, which was very hot, nor the tedium of the
session, which had been very great, nor the anxiety of Ministers,
which was very pressing, had any effect in impairing the energy
of Mr. Turnbull. He was as instant, as oratorical, as hostile, as
indignant about redistribution as he had been about the franchise. He
had been sure then, and he was sure now, that Ministers desired to
burke the question, to deceive the people, to produce a bill that
should be no bill. He brought out his clause,--and made Loughton
his instance. "Would the honourable gentleman who sat lowest on
the Treasury bench,--who at this moment was in sweet confidential
intercourse with the right honourable gentleman now President of the
Board of Trade, who had once been a friend of the people,--would the
young Lord of the Treasury get up in his place and tell them that
no peer of Parliament had at present a voice in sending a member to
their House of Commons,--that no peer would have a voice if this
bill, as proposed by the Government, were passed in its present
useless, ineffectual, conservative, and most dishonest form?"
Phineas, who replied to this, and who told Mr. Turnbull that he
himself could not answer for any peers,--but that he thought it
probable that most peers would, by their opinions, somewhat influence
the opinions of some electors,--was thought to have got out of his
difficulty very well. But there was the clause of Mr. Turnbull to be
dealt with,--a clause directly disfranchising seven single-winged
boroughs, of which Loughton was of course one,--a clause to which the
Government must either submit or object. Submission would be certain
defeat in one way, and objection would be as certain defeat in
another,--if the gentlemen on the other side were not disposed to
assist the ministers. It was said that the Cabinet was divided.
Mr. Gresham and Mr. Monk were for letting the seven boroughs go.
Mr. Mildmay could not bring himself to obey Mr. Turnbull, and Mr.
Palliser supported him. When Mr. Mildmay was told that Mr. Daubeny
would certainly go into the same lobby with Mr. Turnbull respecting
the seven boroughs, he was reported to have said that in that case
Mr. Daubeny must be prepared with a Government. Mr. Daubeny made a
beautiful speech about the seven boroughs;--the seven sins, and seven
stars, and seven churches, and seven lamps. He would make no party
question of this. Gentlemen who usually acted with him would vote
as their own sense of right or wrong directed them;--from which
expression of a special sanction it was considered that these
gentlemen were not accustomed to exercise the privilege now accorded
to them. But in regarding the question as one of right and wrong, and
in looking at what he believed to be both the wish of the country and
its interests, he, Mr. Daubeny,--he, himself, being simply a humble
member of that House,--must support the clause of the honourable
gentleman. Almost all those to whom had been surrendered the
privilege of using their own judgment for that occasion only, used it
discreetly,--as their chief had used it himself,--and Mr. Turnbull
carried his clause by a majority of fifteen. It was then 3 a.m.,
and Mr. Gresham, rising after the division, said that his right
honourable friend the First Lord of the Treasury was too tired
to return to the House, and had requested him to state that the
Government would declare their purpose at 6 p.m. on the following
evening.
Phineas, though he had made his little speech in answer to Mr.
Turnbull with good-humoured flippancy, had recorded his vote in
favour of the seven boroughs with a sore heart. Much as he disliked
Mr. Turnbull, he knew that Mr. Turnbull was right in this. He had
spoken to Mr. Monk on the subject, as it were asking Mr. Monk's
permission to throw up his office, and vote against Mr. Mildmay. But
Mr. Monk was angry with him, telling him that his conscience was of
that restless, uneasy sort which is neither useful nor manly. "We
all know," said Mr. Monk, "and none better than Mr. Mildmay, that
we cannot justify such a borough as Loughton by the theory of our
parliamentary representation,--any more than we can justify the
fact that Huntingdonshire should return as many members as the East
Riding. There must be compromises, and you should trust to others who
have studied the matter more thoroughly than you, to say how far the
compromise should go at the present moment."
"It is the influence of the peer, not the paucity of the electors,"
said Phineas.
"And has no peer any influence in a county? Would you disfranchise
Westmoreland? Believe me, Finn, if you want to be useful, you must
submit yourself in such matters to those with whom you act."
Phineas had no answer to make, but he was not happy in his mind. And
he was the less happy, perhaps, because he was very sure that Mr.
Mildmay would be beaten. Mr. Low in these days harassed him sorely.
Mr. Low was very keen against such boroughs as Loughton, declaring
that Mr. Daubeny was quite right to join his standard to that of Mr.
Turnbull on such an issue. Mr. Low was the reformer now, and Phineas
found himself obliged to fight a losing battle on behalf of an
acknowledged abuse. He never went near Bunce; but, unfortunately for
him, Bunce caught him once in the street and showed him no mercy.
"Slide was a little 'eavy on you in the _Banner_ the other day,--eh,
Mr. Finn?--too 'eavy, as I told him."
"Mr. Slide can be just as heavy as he pleases, Bunce."
"That's in course. The press is free, thank God,--as yet. But it
wasn't any good rattling away at the Earl's little borough when it's
sure to go. Of course it'll go, Mr. Finn."
"I think it will."
"The whole seven on 'em. The 'ouse couldn't but do it. They tell me
it's all Mr. Mildmay's own work, sticking out for keeping on 'em.
He's very old, and so we'll forgive him. But he must go, Mr. Finn."
"We shall know all about that soon, Bunce."
"If you don't get another seat, Mr. Finn, I suppose we shall see you
back at the Inn. I hope we may. It's better than being member for
Loughton, Mr. Finn;--you may be sure of that." And then Mr. Bunce
passed on.
Mr. Turnbull carried his clause, and Loughton was doomed. Loughton
and the other six deadly sins were anathematized, exorcised, and
finally got rid of out of the world by the voices of the gentlemen
who had been proclaiming the beauty of such pleasant vices all their
lives, and who in their hearts hated all changes that tended towards
popular representation. But not the less was Mr. Mildmay beaten;
and, in accordance with the promise made by his first lieutenant
immediately after the vote was taken, the Prime Minister came forward
on the next evening and made his statement. He had already put his
resignation into the hands of Her Majesty, and Her Majesty had
graciously accepted it. He was very old, and felt that the time had
come in which it behoved him to retire into that leisure which he
thought he had, perhaps, earned. He had hoped to carry this bill as
the last act of his political life; but he was too old, too stiff, as
he said, in his prejudices, to bend further than he had bent already,
and he must leave the completion of the matter in other hands. Her
Majesty had sent for Mr. Gresham, and Mr. Gresham had already seen
Her Majesty. Mr. Gresham and his other colleagues, though they
dissented from the clause which had been carried by the united
efforts of gentlemen opposite to him, and of gentlemen below him on
his own side of the House, were younger men than he, and would, for
the country's sake,--and for the sake of Her Majesty,--endeavour
to carry the bill through. There would then, of course, be a
dissolution, and the future Government would, no doubt, depend on
the choice of the country. From all which it was understood that Mr.
Gresham was to go on with the bill to a conclusion, whatever might be
the divisions carried against him, and that a new Secretary of State
for Foreign Affairs must be chosen. Phineas understood, also, that
he had lost his seat at Loughton. For the borough of Loughton there
would never again be an election. "If I had been Mr. Mildmay, I would
have thrown the bill up altogether," Lord Brentford said afterwards;
"but of course it was not for me to interfere."
The session was protracted for two months after that,--beyond the
time at which grouse should have been shot,--and by the 23rd of
August became the law of the land. "I shall never get over it," said
Mr. Ratler to Mr. Finn, seated one terribly hot evening on a bench
behind the Cabinet Ministers,--"never. I don't suppose such a session
for work was ever known before. Think what it is to have to keep
men together in August, with the thermometer at 81°, and the river
stinking like,--like the very mischief." Mr. Ratler, however, did not
die.
On the last day of the session Laurence Fitzgibbon resigned. Rumours
reached the ears of Phineas as to the cause of this, but no certain
cause was told him. It was said that Lord Cantrip had insisted upon
it, Laurence having by mischance been called upon for some official
statement during an unfortunate period of absence. There was,
however, a mystery about it;--but the mystery was not half so
wonderful as the triumph to Phineas, when Mr. Gresham offered him the
place.
"But I shall have no seat," said Phineas.
"We shall none of us have seats to-morrow," said Mr. Gresham.
"But I shall be at a loss to find a place to stand for."
"The election will not come on till November, and you must look about
you. Both Mr. Monk and Lord Brentford seem to think you will be in
the House."
And so the bill was carried, and the session was ended.
CHAPTER XLVIII
"The Duke"
By the middle of September there was assembled a large party at
Matching Priory, a country mansion belonging to Mr. Plantagenet
Palliser. The men had certainly been chosen in reference to their
political feelings and position,--for there was not a guest in
the house who had voted for Mr. Turnbull's clause, or the wife
or daughter, or sister of any one who had so voted. Indeed, in
these days politics ran so high that among politicians all social
gatherings were brought together with some reference to the state
of parties. Phineas was invited, and when he arrived at Matching he
found that half the Cabinet was there. Mr. Kennedy was not there, nor
was Lady Laura. Mr. Monk was there, and the Duke,--with the Duchess,
and Mr. Gresham, and Lord Thrift; Mrs. Max Goesler was there also,
and Mrs. Bonteen,--Mr. Bonteen being detained somewhere out of
the way; and Violet Effingham was expected in two days, and Lord
Chiltern at the end of the week. Lady Glencora took an opportunity
of imparting this latter information to Phineas very soon after his
arrival; and Phineas, as he watched her eye and her mouth while she
spoke, was quite sure that Lady Glencora knew the story of the duel.
"I shall be delighted to see him again," said Phineas. "That is
all right," said Lady Glencora. There were also there Mr. and Mrs.
Grey, who were great friends of the Pallisers,--and on the very day
on which Phineas reached Matching, at half an hour before the time
for dressing, the Duke of Omnium arrived. Now, Mr. Palliser was the
Duke's nephew and heir,--and the Duke of Omnium was a very great
person indeed. I hardly know why it should have been so, but the Duke
of Omnium was certainly a greater man in public estimation than the
other duke then present,--the Duke of St. Bungay. The Duke of St.
Bungay was a useful man, and had been so all his life, sitting in
Cabinets and serving his country, constant as any peer in the House
of Lords, always ready to take on his own shoulders any troublesome
work required of him, than whom Mr. Mildmay, and Mr. Mildmay's
predecessor at the head of the liberal party, had had no more devoted
adherent. But the Duke of Omnium had never yet done a day's work on
behalf of his country. They both wore the Garter, the Duke of St.
Bungay having earned it by service, the Duke of Omnium having been
decorated with the blue ribbon,--because he was Duke of Omnium. The
one was a moral, good man, a good husband, a good father, and a good
friend. The other,--did not bear quite so high a reputation. But men
and women thought but little of the Duke of St. Bungay, while the
other duke was regarded with an almost reverential awe. I think the
secret lay in the simple fact that the Duke of Omnium had not been
common in the eyes of the people. He had contrived to envelope
himself in something of the ancient mystery of wealth and rank.
Within three minutes of the Duke's arrival Mrs. Bonteen, with an air
of great importance, whispered a word to Phineas. "He has come. He
arrived exactly at seven!"
"Who has come?" Phineas asked.
"The Duke of Omnium!" she said, almost reprimanding him by her tone
of voice for his indifference. "There has been a great doubt whether
or no he would show himself at last. Lady Glencora told me that he
never will pledge himself. I am so glad he has come."
"I don't think I ever saw him," said Phineas.
"Oh, I have seen him,--a magnificent-looking man! I think it is so
very nice of Lady Glencora getting him to meet us. It is very rarely
that he will join in a great party, but they say Lady Glencora can do
anything with him since the heir was born. I suppose you have heard
all about that."
"No," said Phineas; "I have heard nothing of the heir, but I know
that there are three or four babies."
"There was no heir, you know, for a year and a half, and they were
all au désespoir; and the Duke was very nearly quarrelling with his
nephew; and Mr. Palliser--; you know it had very nearly come to a
separation."
"I don't know anything at all about it," said Phineas, who was not
very fond of the lady who was giving him the information.
"It is so, I can assure you; but since the boy was born Lady Glencora
can do anything with the Duke. She made him go to Ascot last spring,
and he presented her with the favourite for one of the races on the
very morning the horse ran. They say he gave three thousand pounds
for him."
"And did Lady Glencora win?"
"No;--the horse lost; and Mr. Palliser has never known what to do
with him since. But it was very pretty of the Duke;--was it not?"
Phineas, though he had intended to show to Mrs. Bonteen how little he
thought about the Duke of Omnium,--how small was his respect for a
great peer who took no part in politics,--could not protect himself
from a certain feeling of anxiety as to the aspect and gait and words
of the man of whom people thought so much, of whom he had heard so
often, and of whom he had seen so little. He told himself that the
Duke of Omnium should be no more to him than any other man, but yet
the Duke of Omnium was more to him than other men. When he came
down into the drawing-room he was angry with himself, and stood
apart;--and was then angry with himself again because he stood apart.
Why should he make a difference in his own bearing because there was
such a man in the company? And yet he could not avoid it. When he
entered the room the Duke was standing in a large bow-window, and two
or three ladies and two or three men were standing round him. Phineas
would not go near the group, telling himself that he would not
approach a man so grand as was the Duke of Omnium. He saw Madame Max
Goesler among the party, and after a while he saw her retreat. As she
retreated, Phineas knew that some words from Madame Max Goesler had
not been received with the graciousness which she had expected. There
was the prettiest smile in the world on the lady's face, and she
took a corner on a sofa with an air of perfect satisfaction. But yet
Phineas knew that she had received a wound.
"I called twice on you in London," said Phineas, coming up close to
her, "but was not fortunate enough to find you!"
"Yes;--but you came so late in the season as to make it impossible
that there should be any arrangements for our meeting. What can any
woman do when a gentleman calls on her in August?"
"I came in July."
"Yes, you did; on the 31st. I keep the most accurate record of all
such things, Mr. Finn. But let us hope that we may have better luck
next year. In the meantime, we can only enjoy the good things that
are going."
"Socially, or politically, Madame Goesler?"
"Oh, socially. How can I mean anything else when the Duke of Omnium
is here? I feel so much taller at being in the same house with him.
Do not you? But you are a spoilt child of fortune, and perhaps you
have met him before."
"I think I once saw the back of a hat in the park, and somebody told
me that the Duke's head was inside it."
"And you have never seen him but that once?"
"Never but that once,--till now."
"And do not you feel elated?"
"Of course I do. For what do you take me, Madame Goesler?"
"I do,--immensely. I believe him to be a fool, and I never heard of
his doing a kind act to anybody in my life."
"Not when he gave the racehorse to Lady Glencora?"
"I wonder whether that was true. Did you ever hear of such an
absurdity? As I was saying, I don't think he ever did anything
for anybody;--but then, you know, to be Duke of Omnium! It isn't
necessary,--is it,--that a Duke of Omnium should do anything except
be Duke of Omnium?"
At this moment Lady Glencora came up to Phineas, and took him across
to the Duke. The Duke had expressed a desire to be introduced to him.
Phineas, half-pleased and half-disgusted, had no alternative, and
followed Lady Glencora. The Duke shook hands with him, and made a
little bow, and said something about the garrotters, which Phineas,
in his confusion, did not quite understand. He tried to reply as he
would have replied to anybody else, but the weight of the Duke's
majesty was too much for him, and he bungled. The Duke made another
little bow, and in a moment was speaking a word of condescension
to some other favoured individual. Phineas retreated altogether
disgusted,--hating the Duke, but hating himself worse; but he would
not retreat in the direction of Madame Max Goesler. It might suit
that lady to take an instant little revenge for her discomfiture, but
it did not suit him to do so. The question with him would be, whether
in some future part of his career it might not be his duty to assist
in putting down Dukes of Omnium.
At dinner Phineas sat between Mrs. Bonteen and the Duchess of St.
Bungay, and did not find himself very happy. At the other end of the
table the Duke,--the great Duke, was seated at Lady Glencora's right
hand, and on his other side Fortune had placed Madame Max Goesler.
The greatest interest which Phineas had during the dinner was in
watching the operations,--the triumphantly successful operations of
that lady. Before dinner she had been wounded by the Duke. The Duke
had not condescended to accord the honour of his little bow of
graciousness to some little flattering morsel of wit which the lady
had uttered on his behoof. She had said a sharp word or two in her
momentary anger to Phineas; but when Fortune was so good to her in
that matter of her place at dinner, she was not fool enough to throw
away her chance. Throughout the soup and fish she was very quiet.
She said a word or two after her first glass of champagne. The Duke
refused two dishes, one after another, and then she glided into
conversation. By the time that he had his roast mutton before him she
was in full play, and as she eat her peach, the Duke was bending over
her with his most gracious smile.
"Didn't you think the session was very long, Mr. Finn?" said the
Duchess to Phineas.
"Very long indeed, Duchess," said Phineas, with his attention still
fixed on Madame Max Goesler.
"The Duke found it very troublesome."
"I daresay he did," said Phineas. That duke and that duchess were no
more than any other man and any other man's wife. The session had
not been longer to the Duke of St. Bungay than to all the public
servants. Phineas had the greatest possible respect for the Duke of
St. Bungay, but he could not take much interest in the wailings of
the Duchess on her husband's behalf.
"And things do seem to be so very uncomfortable now," said the
Duchess,--thinking partly of the resignation of Mr. Mildmay, and
partly of the fact that her own old peculiar maid who had lived with
her for thirty years had retired into private life.
"Not so very bad, Duchess, I hope," said Phineas, observing that at
this moment Madame Max Goesler's eyes were brilliant with triumph.
Then there came upon him a sudden ambition,--that he would like to
"cut out" the Duke of Omnium in the estimation of Madame Max Goesler.
The brightness of Madame Max Goesler's eyes had not been thrown away
upon our hero.
Violet Effingham came at the appointed time, and, to the surprise of
Phineas, was brought to Matching by Lord Brentford. Phineas at first
thought that it was intended that the Earl and his son should meet
and make up their quarrel at Mr. Palliser's house. But Lord Brentford
stayed only one night, and Phineas on the next morning heard the
whole history of his coming and going from Violet. "I have almost
been on my knees to him to stay," she said. "Indeed, I did go on my
knees,--actually on my knees."
"And what did he say?"
"He put his arm round me and kissed me, and,--and,--I cannot tell you
all that he said. But it ended in this,--that if Chiltern can be made
to go to Saulsby, fatted calves without stint will be killed. I shall
do all I can to make him go; and so must you, Mr. Finn. Of course
that silly affair in foreign parts is not to make any difference
between you two."
Phineas smiled, and said he would do his best, and looked up into her
face, and was just able to talk to her as though things were going
comfortably with him. But his heart was very cold. As Violet had
spoken to him about Lord Chiltern there had come upon him, for the
first time,--for the first time since he had known that Lord Chiltern
had been refused,--an idea, a doubt, whether even yet Violet might
not become Lord Chiltern's wife. His heart was very sad, but he
struggled on,--declaring that it was incumbent on them both to bring
together the father and son.
"I am so glad to hear you say so, Mr. Finn," said Violet. "I really
do believe that you can do more towards it than any one else. Lord
Chiltern would think nothing of my advice,--would hardly speak to me
on such a subject. But he respects you as well as likes you, and not
the less because of what has occurred."
How was it that Violet should know aught of the respect or liking
felt by this rejected suitor for that other suitor,--who had also
been rejected? And how was it that she was thus able to talk of one
of them to the other, as though neither of them had ever come forward
with such a suit? Phineas felt his position to be so strange as to be
almost burdensome. He had told Violet, when she had refused him, very
plainly, that he should come again to her, and ask once more for the
great gift which he coveted. But he could not ask again now. In the
first place, there was that in her manner which made him sure that
were he to do so, he would ask in vain; and then he felt that she was
placing a special confidence in him, against which he would commit a
sin were he to use her present intimacy with him for the purposes of
making love. They two were to put their shoulders together to help
Lord Chiltern, and while doing so he could not continue a suit which
would be felt by both of them to be hostile to Lord Chiltern. There
might be opportunity for a chance word, and if so the chance word
should be spoken; but he could not make a deliberate attack, such as
he had made in Portman Square. Violet also probably understood that
she had not now been caught in a mousetrap.
The Duke was to spend four days at Matching, and on the third
day,--the day before Lord Chiltern was expected,--he was to be seen
riding with Madame Max Goesler by his side. Madame Max Goesler was
known as a perfect horsewoman,--one indeed who was rather fond of
going a little fast on horseback, and who rode well to hounds. But
the Duke seldom moved out of a walk, and on this occasion Madame Max
was as steady in her seat and almost as slow as the mounted ghost
in _Don Juan_. But it was said by some there, especially by Mrs.
Bonteen, that the conversation between them was not slow. And on the
next morning the Duke and Madame Max Goesler were together again
before luncheon, standing on a terrace at the back of the house,
looking down on a party who were playing croquet on the lawn.
"Do you never play?" said the Duke.
"Oh yes;--one does everything a little."
"I am sure you would play well. Why do you not play now?"
"No;--I shall not play now."
"I should like to see you with your mallet."
"I am sorry your Grace cannot be gratified. I have played croquet
till I am tired of it, and have come to think it is only fit for
boys and girls. The great thing is to give them opportunities for
flirting, and it does that."
"And do you never flirt, Madame Goesler?"
"Never at croquet, Duke."
"And what with you is the choicest time?"
"That depends on so many things,--and so much on the chosen person.
What do you recommend?"
"Ah,--I am so ignorant. I can recommend nothing."
"What do you say to a mountain-top at dawn on a summer day?" asked
Madame Max Goesler.
"You make me shiver," said the Duke.
"Or a boat on a lake on a summer evening, or a good lead after hounds
with nobody else within three fields, or the bottom of a salt-mine,
or the deck of an ocean steamer, or a military hospital in time of
war, or a railway journey from Paris to Marseilles?"
"Madame Max Goesler, you have the most uncomfortable ideas."
"I have no doubt your Grace has tried each of them,--successfully.
But perhaps, after all, a comfortable chair over a good fire, in a
pretty room, beats everything."
"I think it does,--certainly," said the Duke. Then he whispered
something at which Madame Max Goesler blushed and smiled, and
immediately after that she followed those who had already gone in
to lunch.
Mrs. Bonteen had been hovering round the spot on the terrace on which
the Duke and Madame Max Goesler had been standing, looking on with
envious eyes, meditating some attack, some interruption, some excuse
for an interpolation, but her courage had failed her and she had
not dared to approach. The Duke had known nothing of the hovering
propinquity of Mrs. Bonteen, but Madame Goesler had seen and had
understood it all.
"Dear Mrs. Bonteen," she said afterwards, "why did you not come and
join us? The Duke was so pleasant."
"Two is company, and three is none," said Mrs. Bonteen, who in her
anger was hardly able to choose her words quite as well as she might
have done had she been more cool.
"Our friend Madame Max has made quite a new conquest," said Mrs.
Bonteen to Lady Glencora.
"I am so pleased," said Lady Glencora, with apparently unaffected
delight. "It is such a great thing to get anybody to amuse my uncle.
You see everybody cannot talk to him, and he will not talk to
everybody."
"He talked enough to her in all conscience," said Mrs. Bonteen, who
was now more angry than ever.
CHAPTER XLIX
The Duellists Meet
Lord Chiltern arrived, and Phineas was a little nervous as to their
meeting. He came back from shooting on the day in question, and was
told by the servant that Lord Chiltern was in the house. Phineas went
into the billiard-room in his knickerbockers, thinking probably that
he might be there, and then into the drawing-room, and at last into
the library,--but Lord Chiltern was not to be found. At last he came
across Violet.
"Have you seen him?" he asked.
"Yes;--he was with me half an hour since, walking round the gardens."
"And how is he? Come;--tell me something about him."
"I never knew him to be more pleasant. He would give no promise about
Saulsby, but he did not say that he would not go."
"Does he know that I am here?"
"Yes;--I told him so. I told him how much pleasure I should have in
seeing you two together,--as friends."
"And what did he say?"
"He laughed, and said you were the best fellow in the world. You see
I am obliged to be explicit."
"But why did he laugh?" Phineas asked.
"He did not tell me, but I suppose it was because he was thinking of
a little trip he once took to Belgium, and he perceived that I knew
all about it."
"I wonder who told you. But never mind. I do not mean to ask any
questions. As I do not like that our first meeting should be before
all the people in the drawing-room, I will go to him in his own
room."
"Do, do;--that will be so nice of you."
Phineas sent his card up by a servant, and in a few minutes was
standing with his hand on the lock of Lord Chiltern's door. The last
time he had seen this man, they had met with pistols in their hands
to shoot at each other, and Lord Chiltern had in truth done his very
best to shoot his opponent. The cause of quarrel was the same between
them as ever. Phineas had not given up Violet, and had no intention
of giving her up. And he had received no intimation whatever from his
rival that there was to be a truce between them. Phineas had indeed
written in friendship to Lord Chiltern, but he had received no
answer;--and nothing of certainty was to be gathered from the report
which Violet had just made. It might well be that Lord Chiltern
would turn upon him now in his wrath, and that there would be some
scene which in a strange house would be obviously objectionable.
Nevertheless he had resolved that even that would be better than a
chance encounter among strangers in a drawing-room. So the door was
opened and the two men met.
"Well, old fellow," said Lord Chiltern, laughing. Then all doubt was
over, and in a moment Phineas was shaking his former,--and present
friend, warmly by the hand. "So we've come to be an Under-Secretary
have we?--and all that kind of thing."
"I had to get into harness,--when the harness offered itself," said
Phineas.
"I suppose so. It's a deuce of a bore, isn't it?"
"I always liked work, you know."
"I thought you liked hunting better. You used to ride as if you did.
There's Bonebreaker back again in the stable for you. That poor fool
who bought him could do nothing with him, and I let him have his
money back."
"I don't see why you should have done that."
"Because I was the biggest fool of the two. Do you remember when that
brute got me down under the bank in the river? That was about the
nearest touch I ever had. Lord bless me;--how he did squeeze me! So
here you are;--staying with the Pallisers,--one of a Government party
I suppose. But what are you going to do for a seat, my friend?"
"Don't talk about that yet, Chiltern."
"A sore subject,--isn't it? I think they have been quite right, you
know, to put Loughton into the melting-pot,--though I'm sorry enough
for your sake."
"Quite right," said Phineas.
"And yet you voted against it, old chap? But, come; I'm not going to
be down upon you. So my father has been here?"
"Yes;--he was here for a day or two."
"Violet has just been telling me. You and he are as good friends as
ever?"
"I trust we are."
"He never heard of that little affair?" And Lord Chiltern nodded his
head, intending to indicate the direction of Blankenberg.
"I do not think he has yet."
"So Violet tells me. Of course you know that she has heard all about
it."
"I have reason to suppose as much."
"And so does Laura."
"I told her myself," said Phineas.
"The deuce you did! But I daresay it was for the best. It's a pity
you had not proclaimed it at Charing Cross, and then nobody would
have believed a word about it. Of course my father will hear it some
day."
"You are going to Saulsby, I hope, Chiltern?"
"That question is easier asked than answered. It is quite true that
the great difficulty has been got over. Laura has had her money. And
if my father will only acknowledge that he has wronged me throughout,
from beginning to end, I will go to Saulsby to-morrow;--and would cut
you out at Loughton the next day, only that Loughton is not Loughton
any longer."
"You cannot expect your father to do that."
"No;--and therefore there is a difficulty. So you've had that awfully
ponderous Duke here. How did you get on with him?"
"Admirably. He condescended to do something which he called shaking
hands with me."
"He is the greatest old dust out," said Lord Chiltern,
disrespectfully. "Did he take any notice of Violet?"
"Not that I observed."
"He ought not to be allowed into the same room with her." After that
there was a short pause, and Phineas felt some hesitation in speaking
of Miss Effingham to Lord Chiltern. "And how do you get on with her?"
asked Lord Chiltern. Here was a question for a man to answer. The
question was so hard to be answered, that Phineas did not at first
make any attempt to answer it. "You know exactly the ground that I
stand on," continued Lord Chiltern. "She has refused me three times.
Have you been more fortunate?"
Lord Chiltern, as he asked his question, looked full into Finn's face
in a manner that was irresistible. His look was not one of anger nor
even of pride. It was not, indeed, without a strong dash of fun. But
such as it was it showed Phineas that Lord Chiltern intended to have
an answer. "No," said he at last, "I have not been more fortunate."
"Perhaps you have changed your mind," said his host.
"No;--I have not changed my mind," said Phineas, quickly.
"How stands it then? Come;--let us be honest to each other. I told
you down at Willingford that I would quarrel with any man who
attempted to cut me out with Violet Effingham. You made up your mind
that you would do so, and therefore I quarrelled with you. But we
can't always be fighting duels."
"I hope we may not have to fight another."
"No;--it would be absurd," said Lord Chiltern. "I rather think that
what we did was absurd. But upon my life I did not see any other way
out of it. However, that is over. How is it to be now?"
"What am I to say in answer to that?" asked Phineas.
"Just the truth. You have asked her, I suppose?"
"Yes;--I have asked her."
"And she has refused you?"
"Yes;--she has refused me."
"And you mean to ask her again?"
"I shall;--if I ever think that there is a chance. Indeed, Chiltern,
I believe I shall whether I think that I have any chance or not."
"Then we start fairly, Finn. I certainly shall do so. I believe
I once told you that I never would;--but that was long before I
suspected that you would enter for the same plate. What a man says on
such a matter when he is down in the mouth goes for nothing. Now we
understand each other, and you had better go and dress. The bell rang
nearly half an hour ago, and my fellow is hanging about outside the
door."
The interview had in one respect been very pleasant to Phineas, and
in another it had been very bitter. It was pleasant to him to know
that he and Lord Chiltern were again friends. It was a delight to
him to feel that this half-savage but high-spirited young nobleman,
who had been so anxious to fight with him and to shoot him, was
nevertheless ready to own that he had behaved well. Lord Chiltern
had in fact acknowledged that though he had been anxious to blow
out our hero's brains, he was aware all the time that our hero was
a good sort of fellow. Phineas understood this, and felt that it
was pleasant. But with this understanding, and accompanying this
pleasure, there was a conviction in his heart that the distance
between Lord Chiltern and Violet would daily grow to be less and
still less,--and that Lord Chiltern could afford to be generous. If
Miss Effingham could teach herself to be fond of Lord Chiltern, what
had he, Phineas Finn, to offer in opposition to the claims of such a
suitor?
That evening Lord Chiltern took Miss Effingham out to dinner. Phineas
told himself that this was of course so arranged by Lady Glencora,
with the express view of serving the Saulsby interest. It was almost
nothing to him at the moment that Madame Max Goesler was intrusted
to him. He had his ambition respecting Madame Max Goesler; but that
for the time was in abeyance. He could hardly keep his eyes off Miss
Effingham. And yet, as he well knew, his observation of her must be
quite useless. He knew beforehand, with absolute accuracy, the manner
in which she would treat her lover. She would be kind, genial,
friendly, confidential, nay, affectionate; and yet her manner would
mean nothing, would give no clue to her future decision either for or
against Lord Chiltern. It was, as Phineas thought, a peculiarity with
Violet Effingham that she could treat her rejected lovers as dear
familiar friends immediately after her rejection of them.
"Mr. Finn," said Madame Max Goesler, "your eyes and ears are
tell-tales of your passion."
"I hope not," said Phineas, "as I certainly do not wish that any one
should guess how strong is my regard for you."
"That is prettily turned,--very prettily turned; and shows more
readiness of wit than I gave you credit for under your present
suffering. But of course we all know where your heart is. Men do not
undertake perilous journeys to Belgium for nothing."
"That unfortunate journey to Belgium! But, dear Madame Max, really
nobody knows why I went."
"You met Lord Chiltern there?"
"Oh yes;--I met Lord Chiltern there."
"And there was a duel?"
"Madame Max,--you must not ask me to criminate myself!"
"Of course there was, and of course it was about Miss Effingham, and
of course the lady thinks herself bound to refuse both the gentlemen
who were so very wicked, and of course--"
"Well,--what follows?"
"Ah! if you have not wit enough to see, I do not think it can be my
duty to tell you. But I wished to caution you as a friend that your
eyes and ears should be more under your command."
"You will go to Saulsby?" Violet said to Lord Chiltern.
"I cannot possibly tell as yet," said he, frowning.
"Then I can tell you that you ought to go. I do not care a bit for
your frowns. What does the fifth commandment say?"
"If you have no better arguments than the commandments, Violet--"
"There can be none better. Do you mean to say that the commandments
are nothing to you?"
"I mean to say that I shan't go to Saulsby because I am told in the
twentieth chapter of Exodus to honour my father and mother,--and that
I shouldn't believe anybody who told me that he did anything because
of the commandments."
"Oh, Lord Chiltern!"
"People are so prejudiced and so used to humbug that for the most
part they do not in the least know their own motives for what they
do. I will go to Saulsby to-morrow,--for a reward."
"For what reward?" said Violet, blushing.
"For the only one in the world that could tempt me to do anything."
"You should go for the sake of duty. I should not even care to see
you go, much as I long for it, if that feeling did not take you
there."
It was arranged that Phineas and Lord Chiltern were to leave Matching
together. Phineas was to remain at his office all October, and in
November the general election was to take place. What he had hitherto
heard about a future seat was most vague, but he was to meet Ratler
and Barrington Erle in London, and it had been understood that
Barrington Erle, who was now at Saulsby, was to make some inquiry as
to that group of boroughs of which Loughton at this moment formed
one. But as Loughton was the smallest of four boroughs, and as one of
the four had for many years had a representative of its own, Phineas
feared that no success would be found there. In his present agony
he began to think that there might be a strong plea made for a
few private seats in the House of Commons, and that the propriety
of throwing Loughton into the melting-pot was, after all, open to
question. He and Lord Chiltern were to return to London together,
and Lord Chiltern, according to his present scheme, was to proceed
at once to Willingford to look after the cub-hunting. Nothing that
either Violet or Phineas could say to him would induce him to
promise to go to Saulsby. When Phineas pressed it, he was told by
Lord Chiltern that he was a fool for his pains,--by which Phineas
understood perfectly well that when Lord Chiltern did go to Saulsby,
he, Phineas, was to take that as strong evidence that everything was
over for him as regarded Violet Effingham. When Violet expressed her
eagerness that the visit should be made, she was stopped with an
assurance that she could have it done at once if she pleased. Let him
only be enabled to carry with him the tidings of his betrothal, and
he would start for his father's house without an hour's delay. But
this authority Violet would not give him. When he answered her after
this fashion she could only tell him that he was ungenerous. "At any
rate I am not false," he replied on one occasion. "What I say is the
truth."
There was a very tender parting between Phineas and Madame Max
Goesler. She had learned from him pretty nearly all his history, and
certainly knew more of the reality of his affairs than any of those
in London who had been his most staunch friends. "Of course you'll
get a seat," she said as he took his leave of her. "If I understand
it at all, they never throw over an ally so useful as you are."
"But the intention is that in this matter nobody shall any longer
have the power of throwing over, or of not throwing over, anybody."
"That is all very well, my friend; but cakes will still be hot in the
mouth, even though Mr. Daubeny turn purist, with Mr. Turnbull to help
him. If you want any assistance in finding a seat you will not go to
the _People's Banner_,--even yet."
"Certainly not to the _People's Banner_."
"I don't quite understand what the franchise is," continued Madame
Max Goesler.
"Household in boroughs," said Phineas with some energy.
"Very well;--household in boroughs. I daresay that is very fine and
very liberal, though I don't comprehend it in the least. And you want
a borough. Very well. You won't go to the households. I don't think
you will;--not at first, that is."
"Where shall I go then?"
"Oh,--to some great patron of a borough;--or to a club;--or perhaps
to some great firm. The households will know nothing about it till
they are told. Is not that it?"
"The truth is, Madame Max, I do not know where I shall go. I am like
a child lost in a wood. And you may understand this;--if you do not
see me in Park Lane before the end of January, I shall have perished
in the wood."
"Then I will come and find you,--with a troop of householders. You
will come. You will be there. I do not believe in death coming
without signs. You are full of life." As she spoke, she had hold
of his hand, and there was nobody near them. They were in a little
book-room inside the library at Matching, and the door, though not
latched, was nearly closed. Phineas had flattered himself that Madame
Goesler had retreated there in order that this farewell might be
spoken without interruption. "And, Mr. Finn;--I wonder whether I may
say one thing," she continued.
"You may say anything to me," he replied.
"No,--not in this country, in this England. There are things one
may not say here,--that are tabooed by a sort of consent,--and that
without any reason." She paused again, and Phineas was at a loss to
think what was the subject on which she was about to speak. Could she
mean--? No; she could not mean to give him any outward plain-spoken
sign that she was attached to him. It was the peculiar merit of this
man that he was not vain, though much was done to him to fill him
with vanity; and as the idea crossed his brain, he hated himself
because it had been there.
"To me you may say anything, Madame Goesler," he said,--"here in
England, as plainly as though we were in Vienna."
"But I cannot say it in English," she said. Then in French, blushing
and laughing as she spoke,--almost stammering in spite of her usual
self-confidence,--she told him that accident had made her rich, full
of money. Money was a drug with her. Money she knew was wanted, even
for householders. Would he not understand her, and come to her, and
learn from her how faithful a woman could be?
He still was holding her by the hand, and he now raised it to
his lips and kissed it. "The offer from you," he said, "is as
high-minded, as generous, and as honourable as its acceptance by me
would be mean-spirited, vile, and ignoble. But whether I fail or
whether I succeed, you shall see me before the winter is over."
CHAPTER L
Again Successful
Phineas also said a word of farewell to Violet before he left
Matching, but there was nothing peculiar in her little speech to him,
or in his to her. "Of course we shall see each other in London. Don't
talk of not being in the House. Of course you will be in the House."
Then Phineas had shaken his head and smiled. Where was he to find
a requisite number of householders prepared to return him? But as
he went up to London he told himself that the air of the House of
Commons was now the very breath of his nostrils. Life to him without
it would be no life. To have come within the reach of the good things
of political life, to have made his mark so as to have almost insured
future success, to have been the petted young official aspirant of
the day,--and then to sink down into the miserable platitudes of
private life, to undergo daily attendance in law-courts without
a brief, to listen to men who had come to be much below him in
estimation and social intercourse, to sit in a wretched chamber up
three pairs of stairs at Lincoln's Inn, whereas he was now at this
moment provided with a gorgeous apartment looking out into the Park
from the Colonial Office in Downing Street, to be attended by a
mongrel between a clerk and an errand boy at 17s. 6d. a week instead
of by a private secretary who was the son of an earl's sister, and
was petted by countesses' daughters innumerable,--all this would
surely break his heart. He could have done it, so he told himself,
and could have taken glory in doing it, had not these other things
come in his way. But the other things had come. He had run the risk,
and had thrown the dice. And now when the game was so nearly won,
must it be that everything should be lost at last?
He knew that nothing was to be gained by melancholy looks at his
club, or by show of wretchedness at his office. London was very
empty; but the approaching elections still kept some there who
otherwise would have been looking after the first flush of pheasants.
Barrington Erle was there, and was not long in asking Phineas what
were his views.
"Ah;--that is so hard to say. Ratler told me that he would be looking
about."
"Ratler is very well in the House," said Barrington, "but he is of no
use for anything beyond it. I suppose you were not brought up at the
London University?"
"Oh no," said Phineas, remembering the glories of Trinity.
"Because there would have been an opening. What do you say to
Stratford,--the new Essex borough?"
"Broadbury the brewer is there already!"
"Yes;--and ready to spend any money you like to name. Let me see.
Loughton is grouped with Smotherem, and Walker is a deal too strong
at Smotherem to hear of any other claim. I don't think we could dare
to propose it. There are the Chelsea hamlets, but it will take a wack
of money."
"I have not got a wack of money," said Phineas, laughing.
"That's the devil of it. I think, if I were you, I should hark back
upon some place in Ireland. Couldn't you get Laurence to give you up
his seat?"
"What! Fitzgibbon?"
"Yes. He has not a ghost of a chance of getting into office again.
Nothing on earth would induce him to look at a paper during all those
weeks he was at the Colonial Office; and when Cantrip spoke to him,
all he said was, 'Ah, bother!' Cantrip did not like it, I can tell
you."
"But that wouldn't make him give up his seat."
"Of course you'd have to arrange it." By which Phineas understood
Barrington Erle to mean that he, Phineas, was in some way to give to
Laurence Fitzgibbon some adequate compensation for the surrender of
his position as a county member.
"I'm afraid that's out of the question," said Phineas. "If he were to
go, I should not get it."
"Would you have a chance at Loughshane?"
"I was thinking of trying it," said Phineas.
"Of course you know that Morris is very ill." This Mr. Morris was
the brother of Lord Tulla, and was the sitting member of Loughshane.
"Upon my word I think I should try that. I don't see where we're to
put our hands on a seat in England. I don't indeed." Phineas, as
he listened to this, could not help thinking that Barrington Erle,
though he had certainly expressed a great deal of solicitude, was not
as true a friend as he used to be. Perhaps he, Phineas, had risen too
fast, and Barrington Erle was beginning to think that he might as
well be out of the way.
He wrote to his father, asking after the borough, and asking after
the health of Mr. Morris. And in his letter he told his own story
very plainly,--almost pathetically. He perhaps had been wrong to
make the attempt which he had made. He began to believe that he had
been wrong. But at any rate he had made it so far successfully, and
failure now would be doubly bitter. He thought that the party to
which he belonged must now remain in office. It would hardly be
possible that a new election would produce a House of Commons
favourable to a conservative ministry. And with a liberal ministry
he, Phineas, would be sure of his place, and sure of an official
income,--if only he could find a seat. It was all very true, and was
almost pathetic. The old doctor, who was inclined to be proud of his
son, was not unwilling to make a sacrifice. Mrs. Finn declared before
her daughters that if there was a seat in all Ireland, Phineas ought
to have it. And Mary Flood Jones stood by listening, and wondering
what Phineas would do if he lost his seat. Would he come back and
live in County Clare, and be like any other girl's lover? Poor Mary
had come to lose her ambition, and to think that girls whose lovers
stayed at home were the happiest. Nevertheless, she would have walked
all the way to Lord Tulla's house and back again, might that have
availed to get the seat for Phineas. Then there came an express over
from Castlemorris. The doctor was wanted at once to see Mr. Morris.
Mr. Morris was very bad with gout in his stomach. According to the
messenger it was supposed that Mr. Morris was dying. Before Dr. Finn
had had an opportunity of answering his son's letter, Mr. Morris, the
late member for Loughshane, had been gathered to his fathers.
Dr. Finn understood enough of elections for Parliament, and of the
nature of boroughs, to be aware that a candidate's chance of success
is very much improved by being early in the field; and he was aware,
also, that the death of Mr. Morris would probably create various
aspirants for the honour of representing Loughshane. But he could
hardly address the Earl on the subject while the dead body of the
late member was lying in the house at Castlemorris. The bill which
had passed in the late session for reforming the constitution of the
House of Commons had not touched Ireland, a future measure having
been promised to the Irish for their comfort; and Loughshane
therefore was, as to Lord Tulla's influence, the same as it had ever
been. He had not there the plenary power which the other lord had
held in his hands in regard to Loughton;--but still the Castlemorris
interest would go a long way. It might be possible to stand against
it, but it would be much more desirable that the candidate should
have it at his back. Dr. Finn was fully alive to this as he sat
opposite to the old lord, saying now a word about the old lord's gout
in his legs and arms, and then about the gout in the stomach, which
had carried away to another world the lamented late member for the
borough.
"Poor Jack!" said Lord Tulla, piteously. "If I'd known it, I needn't
have paid over two thousand pounds for him last year;--need I,
doctor?"
"No, indeed," said Dr. Finn, feeling that his patient might perhaps
approach the subject of the borough himself.
"He never would live by any rule, you know," said the desolate
brother.
"Very hard to guide;--was he not, my lord?"
"The very devil. Now, you see, I do do what I'm told pretty
well,--don't I, doctor?"
"Sometimes."
"By George, I do nearly always. I don't know what you mean by
sometimes. I've been drinking brandy-and-water till I'm sick of it,
to oblige you, and you tell me about--sometimes. You doctors expect
a man to be a slave. Haven't I kept it out of my stomach?"
"Thank God, yes."
"It's all very well thanking God, but I should have gone as poor Jack
has gone, if I hadn't been the most careful man in the world. He was
drinking champagne ten days ago;--would do it, you know." Lord Tulla
could talk about himself and his own ailments by the hour together,
and Dr. Finn, who had thought that his noble patient was approaching
the subject of the borough, was beginning again to feel that the
double interest of the gout that was present, and the gout that had
passed away, would be too absorbing. He, however, could say but
little to direct the conversation.
"Mr. Morris, you see, lived more in London than you do, and was
subject to temptation."
"I don't know what you call temptation. Haven't I the temptation of a
bottle of wine under my nose every day of my life?"
"No doubt you have."
"And I don't drink it. I hardly ever take above a glass or two of
brown sherry. By George! when I think of it, I wonder at my own
courage. I do, indeed."
"But a man in London, my lord--"
"Why the deuce would he go to London? By-the-bye, what am I to do
about the borough now?"
"Let my son stand for it, if you will, my lord."
"They've clean swept away Brentford's seat at Loughton, haven't they?
Ha, ha, ha! What a nice game for him,--to have been forced to help to
do it himself! There's nobody on earth I pity so much as a radical
peer who is obliged to work like a nigger with a spade to shovel away
the ground from under his own feet. As for me, I don't care who sits
for Loughshane. I did care for poor Jack while he was alive. I don't
think I shall interfere any longer. I am glad it lasted Jack's time."
Lord Tulla had probably already forgotten that he himself had thrown
Jack over for the last session but one.
"Phineas, my lord," began the father, "is now Under-Secretary of
State."
"Oh, I've no doubt he's a very fine fellow;--but you see, he's an
out-and-out Radical."
"No, my lord."
"Then how can he serve with such men as Mr. Gresham and Mr. Monk?
They've turned out poor old Mildmay among them, because he's not fast
enough for them. Don't tell me."
"My anxiety, of course, is for my boy's prospects. He seems to have
done so well in Parliament."
"Why don't he stand for Marylebone or Finsbury?"
"The money, you know, my lord!"
"I shan't interfere here, doctor. If he comes, and the people then
choose to return him, I shall say nothing. They may do just as they
please. They tell me Lambert St. George, of Mockrath, is going to
stand. If he does, it's the d---- piece of impudence I ever heard
of. He's a tenant of my own, though he has a lease for ever; and
his father never owned an acre of land in the county till his uncle
died." Then the doctor knew that, with a little management, the
lord's interest might be secured for his son.
Phineas came over and stood for the borough against Mr. Lambert
St. George, and the contest was sharp enough. The gentry of the
neighbourhood could not understand why such a man as Lord Tulla
should admit a liberal candidate to succeed his brother. No one
canvassed for the young Under-Secretary with more persistent zeal
than did his father, who, when Phineas first spoke of going into
Parliament, had produced so many good arguments against that perilous
step. Lord Tulla's agent stood aloof,--desolate with grief at the
death of the late member. At such a moment of family affliction, Lord
Tulla, he declared, could not think of such a matter as the borough.
But it was known that Lord Tulla was dreadfully jealous of Mr.
Lambert St. George, whose property in that part of the county was now
nearly equal to his own, and who saw much more company at Mockrath
than was ever entertained at Castlemorris. A word from Lord
Tulla,--so said the Conservatives of the county,--would have put
Mr. St. George into the seat; but that word was not spoken, and
the Conservatives of the neighbourhood swore that Lord Tulla was a
renegade. The contest was very sharp, but our hero was returned by a
majority of seventeen votes.
Again successful! As he thought of it he remembered stories of great
generals who were said to have chained Fortune to the wheels of their
chariots, but it seemed to him that the goddess had never served
any general with such staunch obedience as she had displayed in his
cause. Had not everything gone well with him;--so well, as almost to
justify him in expecting that even yet Violet Effingham would become
his wife? Dear, dearest Violet! If he could only achieve that, no
general, who ever led an army across the Alps, would be his equal
either in success or in the reward of success. Then he questioned
himself as to what he would say to Miss Flood Jones on that very
night. He was to meet dear little Mary Flood Jones that evening at a
neighbour's house. His sister Barbara had so told him in a tone of
voice which he quite understood to imply a caution. "I shall be so
glad to see her," Phineas had replied.
"If there ever was an angel on earth, it is Mary," said Barbara Finn.
"I know that she is as good as gold," said Phineas.
"Gold!" replied Barbara,--"gold indeed! She is more precious than
refined gold. But, Phineas, perhaps you had better not single her out
for any special attention. She has thought it wisest to meet you."
"Of course," said Phineas. "Why not?"
"That is all, Phineas. I have nothing more to say. Men of course are
different from girls."
"That's true, Barbara, at any rate."
"Don't laugh at me, Phineas, when I am thinking of nothing but of you
and your interests, and when I am making all manner of excuses for
you because I know what must be the distractions of the world in
which you live." Barbara made more than one attempt to renew the
conversation before the evening came, but Phineas thought that he had
had enough of it. He did not like being told that excuses were made
for him. After all, what had he done? He had once kissed Mary Flood
Jones behind the door.
"I am so glad to see you, Mary," he said, coming and taking a chair
by her side. He had been specially warned not to single Mary out for
his attention, and yet there was the chair left vacant as though it
were expected that he would fall into it.
"Thank you. We did not happen to meet last year, did we,--Mr. Finn?"
"Do not call me Mr. Finn, Mary."
"You are such a great man now!"
"Not at all a great man. If you only knew what little men we
understrappers are in London you would hardly speak to me."
"But you are something--of State now;--are you not?"
"Well;--yes. That's the name they give me. It simply means that if
any member wants to badger some one in the House about the Colonies,
I am the man to be badgered. But if there is any credit to be had, I
am not the man who is to have it."
"But it is a great thing to be in Parliament and in the Government
too."
"It is a great thing for me, Mary, to have a salary, though it may
only be for a year or two. However, I will not deny that it is
pleasant to have been successful."
"It has been very pleasant to us, Phineas. Mamma has been so much
rejoiced."
"I am so sorry not to see her. She is at Floodborough, I suppose."
"Oh, yes;--she is at home. She does not like coming out at night in
winter. I have been staying here you know for two days, but I go home
to-morrow."
"I will ride over and call on your mother." Then there was a pause in
the conversation for a moment. "Does it not seem odd, Mary, that we
should see so little of each other?"
"You are so much away, of course."
"Yes;--that is the reason. But still it seems almost unnatural. I
often wonder when the time will come that I shall be quietly at home
again. I have to be back in my office in London this day week, and
yet I have not had a single hour to myself since I have been at
Killaloe. But I will certainly ride over and see your mother. You
will be at home on Wednesday I suppose."
"Yes,--I shall be at home."
Upon that he got up and went away, but again in the evening he found
himself near her. Perhaps there is no position more perilous to a
man's honesty than that in which Phineas now found himself;--that,
namely, of knowing himself to be quite loved by a girl whom he almost
loves himself. Of course he loved Violet Effingham; and they who talk
best of love protest that no man or woman can be in love with two
persons at once. Phineas was not in love with Mary Flood Jones; but
he would have liked to take her in his arms and kiss her;--he would
have liked to gratify her by swearing that she was dearer to him than
all the world; he would have liked to have an episode,--and did,
at the moment, think that it might be possible to have one life in
London and another life altogether different at Killaloe. "Dear
Mary," he said as he pressed her hand that night, "things will get
themselves settled at last, I suppose." He was behaving very ill to
her, but he did not mean to behave ill.
He rode over to Floodborough, and saw Mrs. Flood Jones. Mrs. Flood
Jones, however, received him very coldly; and Mary did not appear.
Mary had communicated to her mother her resolutions as to her future
life. "The fact is, mamma, I love him. I cannot help it. If he ever
chooses to come for me, here I am. If he does not, I will bear it as
well as I can. It may be very mean of me, but it's true."
CHAPTER LI
Troubles at Loughlinter
There was a dull house at Loughlinter during the greater part of
this autumn. A few men went down for the grouse shooting late in the
season; but they stayed but a short time, and when they went Lady
Laura was left alone with her husband. Mr. Kennedy had explained to
his wife, more than once, that though he understood the duties of
hospitality and enjoyed the performance of them, he had not married
with the intention of living in a whirlwind. He was disposed to think
that the whirlwind had hitherto been too predominant, and had said so
very plainly with a good deal of marital authority. This autumn and
winter were to be devoted to the cultivation of proper relations
between him and his wife. "Does that mean Darby and Joan?" his wife
had asked him, when the proposition was made to her. "It means mutual
regard and esteem," replied Mr. Kennedy in his most solemn tone,
"and I trust that such mutual regard and esteem between us may yet
be possible." When Lady Laura showed him a letter from her brother,
received some weeks after this conversation, in which Lord Chiltern
expressed his intention of coming to Loughlinter for Christmas, he
returned the note to his wife without a word. He suspected that she
had made the arrangement without asking him, and was angry; but he
would not tell her that her brother would not be welcome at his
house. "It is not my doing," she said, when she saw the frown on his
brow.
"I said nothing about anybody's doing," he replied.
"I will write to Oswald and bid him not come, if you wish it. Of
course you can understand why he is coming."
"Not to see me, I am sure," said Mr. Kennedy.
"Nor me," replied Lady Laura. "He is coming because my friend Violet
Effingham will be here."
"Miss Effingham! Why was I not told of this? I knew nothing of Miss
Effingham's coming."
"Robert, it was settled in your own presence last July."
"I deny it."
Then Lady Laura rose up, very haughty in her gait and with something
of fire in her eye, and silently left the room. Mr. Kennedy, when he
found himself alone, was very unhappy. Looking back in his mind to
the summer weeks in London, he remembered that his wife had told
Violet that she was to spend her Christmas at Loughlinter, that he
himself had given a muttered assent and that Violet,--as far as he
could remember,--had made no reply. It had been one of those things
which are so often mentioned, but not settled. He felt that he had
been strictly right in denying that it had been "settled" in his
presence;--but yet he felt that he had been wrong in contradicting
his wife so peremptorily. He was a just man, and he would apologise
for his fault; but he was an austere man, and would take back the
value of his apology in additional austerity. He did not see his wife
for some hours after the conversation which has been narrated, but
when he did meet her his mind was still full of the subject. "Laura",
he said, "I am sorry that I contradicted you."
"I am quite used to it, Robert."
"No;--you are not used to it." She smiled and bowed her head. "You
wrong me by saying that you are used to it." Then he paused a moment,
but she said not a word,--only smiled and bowed her head again. "I
remember," he continued, "that something was said in my presence to
Miss Effingham about her coming here at Christmas. It was so slight,
however, that it had passed out of my memory till recalled by an
effort. I beg your pardon."
"That is unnecessary, Robert."
"It is, dear."
"And do you wish that I should put her off,--or put Oswald off,--or
both? My brother never yet has seen me in your house."
"And whose fault has that been?"
"I have said nothing about anybody's fault, Robert. I merely
mentioned a fact. Will you let me know whether I shall bid him stay
away?"
"He is welcome to come,--only I do not like assignations for
love-making."
"Assignations!"
"Clandestine meetings. Lady Baldock would not wish it."
"Lady Baldock! Do you think that Violet would exercise any secrecy in
the matter,--or that she will not tell Lady Baldock that Oswald will
be here,--as soon as she knows it herself?"
"That has nothing to do with it."
"Surely, Robert, it must have much to do with it. And why should not
these two young people meet? The acknowledged wish of all the family
is that they should marry each other. And in this matter, at any
rate, my brother has behaved extremely well." Mr. Kennedy said
nothing further at the time, and it became an understanding that
Violet Effingham was to be a month at Loughlinter, staying from the
20th of December to the 20th of January, and that Lord Chiltern was
to come there for Christmas,--which with him would probably mean
three days.
Before Christmas came, however, there were various other sources of
uneasiness at Loughlinter. There had been, as a matter of course,
great anxiety as to the elections. With Lady Laura this anxiety had
been very strong, and even Mr. Kennedy had been warmed with some
amount of fire as the announcements reached him of the successes
and of the failures. The English returns came first,--and then
the Scotch, which were quite as interesting to Mr. Kennedy as the
English. His own seat was quite safe,--was not contested; but some
neighbouring seats were sources of great solicitude. Then, when this
was over, there were the tidings from Ireland to be received; and
respecting one special borough in Ireland, Lady Laura evinced more
solicitude than her husband approved. There was much danger for the
domestic bliss of the house of Loughlinter, when things came to such
a pass, and such words were spoken, as the election at Loughshane
produced.
"He is in," said Lady Laura, opening a telegram.
"Who is in?" said Mr. Kennedy, with that frown on his brow to which
his wife was now well accustomed. Though he asked the question, he
knew very well who was the hero to whom the telegram referred.
"Our friend Phineas Finn," said Lady Laura, speaking still with an
excited voice,--with a voice that was intended to display excitement.
If there was to be a battle on this matter, there should be a battle.
She would display all her anxiety for her young friend, and fling
it in her husband's face if he chose to take it as an injury.
What,--should she endure reproach from her husband because she
regarded the interests of the man who had saved his life, of the man
respecting whom she had suffered so many heart-struggles, and as to
whom she had at last come to the conclusion that he should ever be
regarded as a second brother, loved equally with the elder brother?
She had done her duty by her husband,--so at least she had assured
herself;--and should he dare to reproach her on this subject, she
would be ready for the battle. And now the battle came. "I am glad
of this," she said, with all the eagerness she could throw into her
voice. "I am, indeed,--and so ought you to be." The husband's brow
grew blacker and blacker, but still he said nothing. He had long
been too proud to be jealous, and was now too proud to express his
jealousy,--if only he could keep the expression back. But his wife
would not leave the subject. "I am so thankful for this," she said,
pressing the telegram between her hands. "I was so afraid he would
fail!"
"You over-do your anxiety on such a subject," at last he said,
speaking very slowly.
"What do you mean, Robert? How can I be over-anxious? If it concerned
any other dear friend that I have in the world, it would not be an
affair of life and death. To him it is almost so. I would have walked
from here to London to get him his election." And as she spoke she
held up the clenched fist of her left hand, and shook it, while she
still held the telegram in her right hand.
"Laura, I must tell you that it is improper that you should speak
of any man in those terms;--of any man that is a stranger to your
blood."
"A stranger to my blood! What has that to do with it? This man is my
friend, is your friend;--saved your life, has been my brother's best
friend, is loved by my father,--and is loved by me, very dearly. Tell
me what you mean by improper!"
"I will not have you love any man,--very dearly."
"Robert!"
"I tell you that I will have no such expressions from you. They are
unseemly, and are used only to provoke me."
"Am I to understand that I am insulted by an accusation? If so, let
me beg at once that I may be allowed to go to Saulsby. I would rather
accept your apology and retractation there than here."
"You will not go to Saulsby, and there has been no accusation, and
there will be no apology. If you please there will be no more mention
of Mr. Finn's name between us, for the present. If you will take my
advice you will cease to think of him extravagantly;--and I must
desire you to hold no further direct communication with him."
"I have held no communication with him," said Lady Laura, advancing a
step towards him. But Mr. Kennedy simply pointed to the telegram in
her hand, and left the room. Now in respect to this telegram there
had been an unfortunate mistake. I am not prepared to say that there
was any reason why Phineas himself should not have sent the news of
his success to Lady Laura; but he had not done so. The piece of paper
which she still held crushed in her hand was in itself very innocent.
"Hurrah for the Loughshanes. Finny has done the trick." Such were
the words written on the slip, and they had been sent to Lady Laura
by her young cousin, the clerk in the office who acted as private
secretary to the Under-Secretary of State. Lady Laura resolved that
her husband should never see those innocent but rather undignified
words. The occasion had become one of importance, and such words were
unworthy of it. Besides, she would not condescend to defend herself
by bringing forward a telegram as evidence in her favour. So she
burned the morsel of paper.
Lady Laura and Mr. Kennedy did not meet again till late that evening.
She was ill, she said, and would not come down to dinner. After
dinner she wrote him a note. "Dear Robert, I think you must regret
what you said to me. If so, pray let me have a line from you to that
effect. Yours affectionately, L." When the servant handed it to him,
and he had read it, he smiled and thanked the girl who had brought
it, and said he would see her mistress just now. Anything would be
better than that the servants should know that there was a quarrel.
But every servant in the house had known all about it for the last
three hours. When the door was closed and he was alone, he sat
fingering the note, thinking deeply how he should answer it, or
whether he would answer it at all. No; he would not answer it;--not
in writing. He would give his wife no written record of his
humiliation. He had not acted wrongly. He had said nothing more than
now, upon mature consideration, he thought that the circumstances
demanded. But yet he felt that he must in some sort withdraw the
accusation which he had made. If he did not withdraw it, there was no
knowing what his wife might do. About ten in the evening he went up
to her and made his little speech. "My dear, I have come to answer
your note."
"I thought you would have written to me a line."
"I have come instead, Laura. Now, if you will listen to me for one
moment, I think everything will be made smooth."
"Of course I will listen," said Lady Laura, knowing very well that
her husband's moment would be rather tedious, and resolving that she
also would have her moment afterwards.
"I think you will acknowledge that if there be a difference of
opinion between you and me as to any question of social intercourse,
it will be better that you should consent to adopt my opinion."
"You have the law on your side."
"I am not speaking of the law."
"Well;--go on, Robert. I will not interrupt you if I can help it."
"I am not speaking of the law. I am speaking simply of convenience,
and of that which you must feel to be right. If I wish that your
intercourse with any person should be of such or such a nature it
must be best that you should comply with my wishes." He paused for
her assent, but she neither assented nor dissented. "As far as I can
understand the position of a man and wife in this country, there is
no other way in which life can be made harmonious."
"Life will not run in harmonies."
"I expect that ours shall be made to do so, Laura. I need hardly say
to you that I intend to accuse you of no impropriety of feeling in
reference to this young man."
"No, Robert; you need hardly say that. Indeed, to speak my own mind,
I think that you need hardly have alluded to it. I might go further,
and say that such an allusion is in itself an insult,--an insult now
repeated after hours of deliberation,--an insult which I will not
endure to have repeated again. If you say another word in any way
suggesting the possibility of improper relations between me and Mr.
Finn, either as to deeds or thoughts, as God is above me, I will
write to both my father and my brother, and desire them to take me
from your house. If you wish me to remain here, you had better be
careful!" As she was making this speech, her temper seemed to rise,
and to become hot, and then hotter, till it glowed with a red heat.
She had been cool till the word insult, used by herself, had conveyed
back to her a strong impression of her own wrong,--or perhaps I
should rather say a strong feeling of the necessity of becoming
indignant. She was standing as she spoke, and the fire flashed from
her eyes, and he quailed before her. The threat which she had held
out to him was very dreadful to him. He was a man terribly in fear
of the world's good opinion, who lacked the courage to go through a
great and harassing trial in order that something better might come
afterwards. His married life had been unhappy. His wife had not
submitted either to his will or to his ways. He had that great desire
to enjoy his full rights, so strong in the minds of weak, ambitious
men, and he had told himself that a wife's obedience was one of those
rights which he could not abandon without injury to his self-esteem.
He had thought about the matter, slowly, as was his wont, and had
resolved that he would assert himself. He had asserted himself, and
his wife told him to his face that she would go away and leave him.
He could detain her legally, but he could not do even that without
the fact of such forcible detention being known to all the world.
How was he to answer her now at this moment, so that she might not
write to her father, and so that his self-assertion might still be
maintained?
"Passion, Laura, can never be right."
"Would you have a woman submit to insult without passion? I at any
rate am not such a woman." Then there was a pause for a moment. "If
you have nothing else to say to me, you had better leave me. I am far
from well, and my head is throbbing."
He came up and took her hand, but she snatched it away from him.
"Laura," he said, "do not let us quarrel."
"I certainly shall quarrel if such insinuations are repeated."
"I made no insinuation."
"Do not repeat them. That is all."
He was cowed and left her, having first attempted to get out of the
difficulty of his position by making much of her alleged illness, and
by offering to send for Dr. Macnuthrie. She positively refused to see
Dr. Macnuthrie, and at last succeeded in inducing him to quit the
room.
This had occurred about the end of November, and on the 20th of
December Violet Effingham reached Loughlinter. Life in Mr. Kennedy's
house had gone quietly during the intervening three weeks, but not
very pleasantly. The name of Phineas Finn had not been mentioned.
Lady Laura had triumphed; but she had no desire to acerbate her
husband by any unpalatable allusion to her victory. And he was quite
willing to let the subject die away, if only it would die. On some
other matters he continued to assert himself, taking his wife to
church twice every Sunday, using longer family prayers than she
approved, reading an additional sermon himself every Sunday evening,
calling upon her for weekly attention to elaborate household
accounts, asking for her personal assistance in much local visiting,
initiating her into his favourite methods of family life in the
country, till sometimes she almost longed to talk again about Phineas
Finn, so that there might be a rupture, and she might escape. But her
husband asserted himself within bounds, and she submitted, longing
for the coming of Violet Effingham. She could not write to her father
and beg to be taken away, because her husband would read a sermon to
her on Sunday evening.
To Violet, very shortly after her arrival, she told her whole story.
"This is terrible," said Violet. "This makes me feel that I never
will be married."
"And yet what can a woman become if she remain single? The curse is
to be a woman at all."
"I have always felt so proud of the privileges of my sex," said
Violet.
"I never have found them," said the other; "never. I have tried to
make the best of its weaknesses, and this is what I have come to! I
suppose I ought to have loved some man."
"And did you never love any man?"
"No;--I think I never did,--not as people mean when they speak of
love. I have felt that I would consent to be cut in little pieces for
my brother,--because of my regard for him."
"Ah, that is nothing."
"And I have felt something of the same thing for another,--a longing
for his welfare, a delight to hear him praised, a charm in his
presence,--so strong a feeling for his interest, that were he to go
to wrack and ruin, I too, should, after a fashion, be wracked and
ruined. But it has not been love either."
"Do I know whom you mean? May I name him? It is Phineas Finn."
"Of course it is Phineas Finn."
"Did he ever ask you,--to love him?"
"I feared he would do so, and therefore accepted Mr. Kennedy's offer
almost at the first word."
"I do not quite understand your reasoning, Laura."
"I understand it. I could have refused him nothing in my power to
give him, but I did not wish to be his wife."
"And he never asked you?"
Lady Laura paused a moment, thinking what reply she should make;--and
then she told a fib. "No; he never asked me." But Violet did not
believe the fib. Violet was quite sure that Phineas had asked Lady
Laura Standish to be his wife. "As far as I can see," said Violet,
"Madame Max Goesler is his present passion."
"I do not believe it in the least," said Lady Laura, firing up.
"It does not much matter," said Violet.
"It would matter very much. You know, you,--you; you know whom he
loves. And I do believe that sooner or later you will be his wife."
"Never."
"Yes, you will. Had you not loved him you would never have
condescended to accuse him about that woman."
"I have not accused him. Why should he not marry Madame Max Goesler?
It would be just the thing for him. She is very rich."
"Never. You will be his wife."
"Laura, you are the most capricious of women. You have two dear
friends, and you insist that I shall marry them both. Which shall I
take first?"
"Oswald will be here in a day or two, and you can take him if you
like it. No doubt he will ask you. But I do not think you will."
"No; I do not think I shall. I shall knock under to Mr. Mill, and
go in for women's rights, and look forward to stand for some female
borough. Matrimony never seemed to me to be very charming, and
upon my word it does not become more alluring by what I find at
Loughlinter."
It was thus that Violet and Lady Laura discussed these matters
together, but Violet had never showed to her friend the cards in her
hand, as Lady Laura had shown those which she held. Lady Laura had
in fact told almost everything that there was to tell,--had spoken
either plainly with true words, or equally plainly with words that
were not true. Violet Effingham had almost come to love Phineas
Finn;--but she never told her friend that it was so. At one time
she had almost made up her mind to give herself and all her wealth
to this adventurer. He was a better man, she thought, than Lord
Chiltern; and she had come to persuade herself that it was almost
imperative on her to take the one or the other. Though she could
talk about remaining unmarried, she knew that that was practically
impossible. All those around her,--those of the Baldock as well as
those of the Brentford faction,--would make such a life impossible
to her. Besides, in such a case what could she do? It was all very
well to talk of disregarding the world and of setting up a house for
herself;--but she was quite aware that that project could not be used
further than for the purpose of scaring her amiable aunt. And if not
that,--then could she content herself to look forward to a joint life
with Lady Baldock and Augusta Boreham? She might, of course, oblige
her aunt by taking Lord Fawn, or oblige her aunt equally by taking
Mr. Appledom; but she was strongly of opinion that either Lord
Chiltern or Phineas would be preferable to these. Thinking over it
always she had come to feel that it must be either Lord Chiltern or
Phineas; but she had never whispered her thought to man or woman. On
her journey to Loughlinter, where she then knew that she was to meet
Lord Chiltern, she endeavoured to persuade herself that it should be
Phineas. But Lady Laura had marred it all by that ill-told fib. There
had been a moment before in which Violet had felt that Phineas had
sacrificed something of that truth of love for which she gave him
credit to the glances of Madame Goesler's eyes; but she had rebuked
herself for the idea, accusing herself not only of a little jealousy,
but of foolish vanity. Was he, whom she had rejected, not to speak to
another woman? Then came the blow from Lady Laura, and Violet knew
that it was a blow. This gallant lover, this young Crichton, this
unassuming but ardent lover, had simply taken up with her as soon as
he had failed with her friend. Lady Laura had been most enthusiastic
in her expressions of friendship. Such platonic regards might be all
very well. It was for Mr. Kennedy to look to that. But, for herself,
she felt that such expressions were hardly compatible with her ideas
of having her lover all to herself. And then she again remembered
Madame Goesler's bright blue eyes.
Lord Chiltern came on Christmas eve, and was received with open arms
by his sister, and with that painful, irritating affection which
such a girl as Violet can show to such a man as Lord Chiltern, when
she will not give him that other affection for which his heart is
panting. The two men were civil to each other,--but very cold. They
called each other Kennedy and Chiltern, but even that was not done
without an effort. On the Christmas morning Mr. Kennedy asked his
brother-in-law to go to church. "It's a kind of thing I never do,"
said Lord Chiltern. Mr. Kennedy gave a little start, and looked a
look of horror. Lady Laura showed that she was unhappy. Violet
Effingham turned away her face, and smiled.
As they walked across the park Violet took Lord Chiltern's part. "He
only means that he does not go to church on Christmas day."
"I don't know what he means," said Mr. Kennedy.
"We need not speak of it," said Lady Laura.
"Certainly not," said Mr. Kennedy.
"I have been to church with him on Sundays myself," said Violet,
perhaps not reflecting that the practices of early years had little
to do with the young man's life at present.
Christmas day and the next day passed without any sign from Lord
Chiltern, and on the day after that he was to go away. But he was not
to leave till one or two in the afternoon. Not a word had been said
between the two women, since he had been in the house, on the subject
of which both of them were thinking. Very much had been said of
the expediency of his going to Saulsby, but on this matter he had
declined to make any promise. Sitting in Lady Laura's room, in the
presence of both of them, he had refused to do so. "I am bad to
drive," he said, turning to Violet, "and you had better not try to
drive me."
"Why should not you be driven as well as another?" she answered,
laughing.
CHAPTER LII
The First Blow
Lord Chiltern, though he had passed two entire days in the house with
Violet without renewing his suit, had come to Loughlinter for the
express purpose of doing so, and had his plans perfectly fixed in his
own mind. After breakfast on that last morning he was up-stairs with
his sister in her own room, and immediately made his request to her.
"Laura," he said, "go down like a good girl, and make Violet come up
here." She stood a moment looking at him and smiled. "And, mind," he
continued, "you are not to come back yourself. I must have Violet
alone."
"But suppose Violet will not come? Young ladies do not generally wait
upon young men on such occasions."
"No;--but I rank her so high among young women, that I think she will
have common sense enough to teach her that, after what has passed
between us, I have a right to ask for an interview, and that it may
be more conveniently had here than in the wilderness of the house
below."
Whatever may have been the arguments used by her friend, Violet did
come. She reached the door all alone, and opened it bravely. She had
promised herself, as she came along the passages, that she would not
pause with her hand on the lock for a moment. She had first gone to
her own room, and as she left it she had looked into the glass with
a hurried glance, and had then rested for a moment,--thinking that
something should be done, that her hair might be smoothed, or a
ribbon set straight, or the chain arranged under her brooch. A girl
would wish to look well before her lover, even when she means to
refuse him. But her pause was but for an instant, and then she went
on, having touched nothing. She shook her head and pressed her hands
together, and went on quick and opened the door,--almost with a
little start. "Violet, this is very good of you," said Lord Chiltern,
standing with his back to the fire, and not moving from the spot.
"Laura has told me that you thought I would do as much as this for
you, and therefore I have done it."
"Thanks, dearest. It is the old story, Violet, and I am so bad at
words!"
"I must have been bad at words too, as I have not been able to make
you understand."
"I think I have understood. You are always clear-spoken, and I,
though I cannot talk, am not muddle-pated. I have understood. But
while you are single there must be yet hope;--unless, indeed, you
will tell me that you have already given yourself to another man."
"I have not done that."
"Then how can I not hope? Violet, I would if I could tell you all my
feelings plainly. Once, twice, thrice, I have said to myself that I
would think of you no more. I have tried to persuade myself that I am
better single than married."
"But I am not the only woman."
"To me you are,--absolutely, as though there were none other on the
face of God's earth. I live much alone; but you are always with me.
Should you marry any other man, it will be the same with me still. If
you refuse me now I shall go away,--and live wildly."
"Oswald, what do you mean?"
"I mean that I will go to some distant part of the world, where I
may be killed or live a life of adventure. But I shall do so simply
in despair. It will not be that I do not know how much better and
greater should be the life at home of a man in my position."
"Then do not talk of going."
"I cannot stay. You will acknowledge, Violet, that I have never lied
to you. I am thinking of you day and night. The more indifferent you
show yourself to me, the more I love you. Violet, try to love me." He
came up to her, and took her by both her hands, and tears were in his
eyes. "Say you will try to love me."
"It is not that," said Violet, looking away, but still leaving her
hands with him.
"It is not what, dear?"
"What you call,--trying."
"It is that you do not wish to try?"
"Oswald, you are so violent, so headstrong. I am afraid of you,--as
is everybody. Why have you not written to your father, as we have
asked you?"
"I will write to him instantly, now, before I leave the room, and
you shall dictate the letter to him. By heavens, you shall!" He had
dropped her hands when she called him violent; but now he took them
again, and still she permitted it. "I have postponed it only till I
had spoken to you once again."
"No, Lord Chiltern, I will not dictate to you."
"But will you love me?" She paused and looked down, having even now
not withdrawn her hands from him. But I do not think he knew how much
he had gained. "You used to love me,--a little," he said.
"Indeed,--indeed, I did."
"And now? Is it all changed now?"
"No," she said, retreating from him.
"How is it, then? Violet, speak to me honestly. Will you be my wife?"
She did not answer him, and he stood for a moment looking at her.
Then he rushed at her, and, seizing her in his arms, kissed her all
over,--her forehead, her lips, her cheeks, then both her hands, and
then her lips again. "By G----, she is my own!" he said. Then he went
back to the rug before the fire, and stood there with his back turned
to her. Violet, when she found herself thus deserted, retreated to
a sofa, and sat herself down. She had no negative to produce now in
answer to the violent assertion which he had pronounced as to his
own success. It was true. She had doubted, and doubted,--and still
doubted. But now she must doubt no longer. Of one thing she was quite
sure. She could love him. As things had now gone, she would make
him quite happy with assurances on that subject. As to that other
question,--that fearful question, whether or not she could trust
him,--on that matter she had better at present say nothing, and
think as little, perhaps, as might be. She had taken the jump, and
therefore why should she not be gracious to him? But how was she to
be gracious to a lover who stood there with his back turned to her?
After the interval of a minute or two he remembered himself, and
turned round. Seeing her seated, he approached her, and went down on
both knees close at her feet. Then he took her hands again, for the
third time, and looked up into her eyes.
"Oswald, you on your knees!" she said.
"I would not bend to a princess," he said, "to ask for half her
throne; but I will kneel here all day, if you will let me, in thanks
for the gift of your love. I never kneeled to beg for it."
"This is the man who cannot make speeches."
"I think I could talk now by the hour, with you for a listener."
"Oh, but I must talk too."
"What will you say to me?"
"Nothing while you are kneeling. It is not natural that you should
kneel. You are like Samson with his locks shorn, or Hercules with a
distaff."
"Is that better?" he said, as he got up and put his arm round her
waist.
"You are in earnest?" she asked.
"In earnest. I hardly thought that that would be doubted. Do you not
believe me?"
"I do believe you. And you will be good?"
"Ah,--I do not know that."
"Try, and I will love you so dearly. Nay, I do love you dearly. I do.
I do."
"Say it again."
"I will say it fifty times,--till your ears are weary with it";--and
she did say it to him, after her own fashion, fifty times.
"This is a great change," he said, getting up after a while and
walking about the room.
"But a change for the better;--is it not, Oswald?"
"So much for the better that I hardly know myself in my new joy. But,
Violet, we'll have no delay,--will we? No shilly-shallying. What is
the use of waiting now that it's settled?"
"None in the least, Lord Chiltern. Let us say,--this day
twelvemonth."
"You are laughing at me, Violet."
"Remember, sir, that the first thing you have to do is to write to
your father."
He instantly went to the writing-table and took up paper and pen.
"Come along," he said. "You are to dictate it." But this she refused
to do, telling him that he must write his letter to his father out of
his own head, and out of his own heart. "I cannot write it," he said,
throwing down the pen. "My blood is in such a tumult that I cannot
steady my hand."
"You must not be so tumultuous, Oswald, or I shall have to live in a
whirlwind."
"Oh, I shall shake down. I shall become as steady as an old stager.
I'll go as quiet in harness by-and-by as though I had been broken
to it a four-year-old. I wonder whether Laura could not write this
letter."
"I think you should write it yourself, Oswald."
"If you bid me I will."
"Bid you indeed! As if it was for me to bid you. Do you not know that
in these new troubles you are undertaking you will have to bid me in
everything, and that I shall be bound to do your bidding? Does it not
seem to be dreadful? My wonder is that any girl can ever accept any
man."
"But you have accepted me now."
"Yes, indeed."
"And you repent?"
"No, indeed, and I will try to do your biddings;--but you must not be
rough to me, and outrageous, and fierce,--will you, Oswald?"
"I will not at any rate be like Kennedy is with poor Laura."
"No;--that is not your nature."
"I will do my best, dearest. And you may at any rate be sure of this,
that I will love you always. So much good of myself, if it be good, I
can say."
"It is very good," she answered; "the best of all good words. And now
I must go. And as you are leaving Loughlinter I will say good-bye.
When am I to have the honour and felicity of beholding your lordship
again?"
"Say a nice word to me before I am off, Violet."
"I,--love,--you,--better,--than all the world beside; and I mean,--to
be your wife,--some day. Are not those twenty nice words?"
He would not prolong his stay at Loughlinter, though he was asked
to do so both by Violet and his sister, and though, as he confessed
himself, he had no special business elsewhere. "It is no use mincing
the matter. I don't like Kennedy, and I don't like being in his
house," he said to Violet. And then he promised that there should be
a party got up at Saulsby before the winter was over. His plan was
to stop that night at Carlisle, and write to his father from thence.
"Your blood, perhaps, won't be so tumultuous at Carlisle," said
Violet. He shook his head and went on with his plans. He would then
go on to London and down to Willingford, and there wait for his
father's answer. "There is no reason why I should lose more of
the hunting than necessary." "Pray don't lose a day for me," said
Violet. As soon as he heard from his father, he would do his father's
bidding. "You will go to Saulsby," said Violet; "you can hunt at
Saulsby, you know."
"I will go to Jericho if he asks me, only you will have to go with
me." "I thought we were to go to,--Belgium," said Violet.
"And so that is settled at last," said Violet to Laura that night.
"I hope you do not regret it."
"On the contrary, I am as happy as the moments are long."
"My fine girl!"
"I am happy because I love him. I have always loved him. You have
known that."
"Indeed, no."
"But I have, after my fashion. I am not tumultuous, as he calls
himself. Since he began to make eyes at me when he was nineteen--"
"Fancy Oswald making eyes!"
"Oh, he did, and mouths too. But from the beginning, when I was a
child, I have known that he was dangerous, and I have thought that
he would pass on and forget me after a while. And I could have lived
without him. Nay, there have been moments when I thought I could
learn to love some one else."
"Poor Phineas, for instance."
"We will mention no names. Mr. Appledom, perhaps, more likely. He
has been my most constant lover, and then he would be so safe! Your
brother, Laura, is dangerous. He is like the bad ice in the parks
where they stick up the poles. He has had a pole stuck upon him ever
since he was a boy."
"Yes;--give a dog a bad name and hang him."
"Remember that I do not love him a bit the less on that
account;--perhaps the better. A sense of danger does not make me
unhappy, though the threatened evil may be fatal. I have entered
myself for my forlorn hope, and I mean to stick to it. Now I must go
and write to his worship. Only think,--I never wrote a love-letter
yet!"
Nothing more shall be said about Miss Effingham's first love-letter,
which was, no doubt, creditable to her head and heart; but there were
two other letters sent by the same post from Loughlinter which shall
be submitted to the reader, as they will assist the telling of the
story. One was from Lady Laura Kennedy to her friend Phineas Finn,
and the other from Violet to her aunt, Lady Baldock. No letter was
written to Lord Brentford, as it was thought desirable that he should
receive the first intimation of what had been done from his son.
Respecting the letter to Phineas, which shall be first given, Lady
Laura thought it right to say a word to her husband. He had been of
course told of the engagement, and had replied that he could have
wished that the arrangement could have been made elsewhere than at
his house, knowing as he did that Lady Baldock would not approve
of it. To this Lady Laura had made no reply, and Mr. Kennedy had
condescended to congratulate the bride-elect. When Lady Laura's
letter to Phineas was completed she took care to put it into the
letter-box in the presence of her husband. "I have written to Mr.
Finn," she said, "to tell him of this marriage."
"Why was it necessary that he should be told?"
"I think it was due to him,--from certain circumstances."
"I wonder whether there was any truth in what everybody was saying
about their fighting a duel?" asked Mr. Kennedy. His wife made no
answer, and then he continued--"You told me of your own knowledge
that it was untrue."
"Not of my own knowledge, Robert."
"Yes;--of your own knowledge." Then Mr. Kennedy walked away, and was
certain that his wife had deceived him about the duel. There had
been a duel, and she had known it; and yet she had told him that the
report was a ridiculous fabrication. He never forgot anything. He
remembered at this moment the words of the falsehood, and the look
of her face as she told it. He had believed her implicitly, but he
would never believe her again. He was one of those men who, in spite
of their experience of the world, of their experience of their own
lives, imagine that lips that have once lied can never tell the
truth.
Lady Laura's letter to Phineas was as follows:
Loughlinter, December 28th, 186--.
MY DEAR FRIEND,
Violet Effingham is here, and Oswald has just left us.
It is possible that you may see him as he passes through
London. But, at any rate, I think it best to let you know
immediately that she has accepted him,--at last. If there
be any pang in this to you, be sure that I will grieve
for you. You will not wish me to say that I regret that
which was the dearest wish of my heart before I knew you.
Lately, indeed, I have been torn in two ways. You will
understand what I mean, and I believe I need say nothing
more;--except this, that it shall be among my prayers that
you may obtain all things that may tend to make you happy,
honourable, and of high esteem.
Your most sincere friend
LAURA KENNEDY.
Even though her husband should read the letter, there was nothing in
that of which she need be ashamed. But he did not read the letter.
He simply speculated as to its contents, and inquired within himself
whether it would not be for the welfare of the world in general, and
for the welfare of himself in particular, that husbands should demand
to read their wives' letters.
And this was Violet's letter to her aunt:--
MY DEAR AUNT,
The thing has come at last, and all your troubles will be
soon over;--for I do believe that all your troubles have
come from your unfortunate niece. At last I am going to
be married, and thus take myself off your hands. Lord
Chiltern has just been here, and I have accepted him. I am
afraid you hardly think so well of Lord Chiltern as I do;
but then, perhaps, you have not known him so long. You do
know, however, that there has been some difference between
him and his father. I think I may take upon myself to say
that now, upon his engagement, this will be settled. I
have the inexpressible pleasure of feeling sure that Lord
Brentford will welcome me as his daughter-in-law. Tell the
news to Augusta with my best love. I will write to her in
a day or two. I hope my cousin Gustavus will condescend
to give me away. Of course there is nothing fixed about
time;--but I should say, perhaps, in nine years.
Your affectionate niece,
VIOLET EFFINGHAM.
Loughlinter, Friday.
"What does she mean about nine years?" said Lady Baldock in her
wrath.
"She is joking," said the mild Augusta.
"I believe she would--joke, if I were going to be buried," said Lady
Baldock.
CHAPTER LIII
Showing How Phineas Bore the Blow
When Phineas received Lady Laura Kennedy's letter, he was sitting in
his gorgeous apartment in the Colonial Office. It was gorgeous in
comparison with the very dingy room at Mr. Low's to which he had been
accustomed in his early days,--and somewhat gorgeous also as compared
with the lodgings he had so long inhabited in Mr. Bunce's house. The
room was large and square, and looked out from three windows on to
St. James's Park. There were in it two very comfortable arm-chairs
and a comfortable sofa. And the office table at which he sat was of
old mahogany, shining brightly, and seemed to be fitted up with every
possible appliance for official comfort. This stood near one of the
windows, so that he could sit and look down upon the park. And there
was a large round table covered with books and newspapers. And the
walls of the room were bright with maps of all the colonies. And
there was one very interesting map,--but not very bright,--showing
the American colonies, as they used to be. And there was a little
inner closet in which he could brush his hair and wash his hands; and
in the room adjoining there sat,--or ought to have sat, for he was
often absent, vexing the mind of Phineas,--the Earl's nephew, his
private secretary. And it was all very gorgeous. Often as he looked
round upon it, thinking of his old bedroom at Killaloe, of his little
garrets at Trinity, of the dingy chambers in Lincoln's Inn, he would
tell himself that it was very gorgeous. He would wonder that anything
so grand had fallen to his lot.
The letter from Scotland was brought to him in the afternoon, having
reached London by some day-mail from Glasgow. He was sitting at his
desk with a heap of papers before him referring to a contemplated
railway from Halifax, in Nova Scotia, to the foot of the Rocky
Mountains. It had become his business to get up the subject, and then
discuss with his principal, Lord Cantrip, the expediency of advising
the Government to lend a company five million of money, in order
that this railway might be made. It was a big subject, and the
contemplation of it gratified him. It required that he should look
forward to great events, and exercise the wisdom of a statesman. What
was the chance of these colonies being swallowed up by those other
regions,--once colonies,--of which the map that hung in the corner
told so eloquent a tale? And if so, would the five million ever be
repaid? And if not swallowed up, were the colonies worth so great an
adventure of national money? Could they repay it? Would they do so?
Should they be made to do so? Mr. Low, who was now a Q.C. and in
Parliament, would not have greater subjects than this before him,
even if he should come to be Solicitor General. Lord Cantrip had
specially asked him to get up this matter,--and he was getting it up
sedulously. Once in nine years the harbour of Halifax was blocked up
by ice. He had just jotted down the fact, which was material, when
Lady Laura's letter was brought to him. He read it, and putting
it down by his side very gently, went back to his maps as though
the thing would not so trouble his mind as to disturb his work. He
absolutely wrote, automatically, certain words of a note about the
harbour, after he had received the information. A horse will gallop
for some scores of yards, after his back has been broken, before
he knows of his great ruin;--and so it was with Phineas Finn. His
back was broken, but, nevertheless, he galloped, for a yard or two.
"Closed in 1860-61 for thirteen days." Then he began to be aware that
his back was broken, and that the writing of any more notes about the
ice in Halifax harbour was for the present out of the question. "I
think it best to let you know immediately that she has accepted him."
These were the words which he read the oftenest. Then it was all
over! The game was played out, and all his victories were as nothing
to him. He sat for an hour in his gorgeous room thinking of it, and
various were the answers which he gave during the time to various
messages;--but he would see nobody. As for the colonies, he did not
care if they revolted to-morrow. He would have parted with every
colony belonging to Great Britain to have gotten the hand of Violet
Effingham for himself. Now,--now at this moment, he told himself with
oaths that he had never loved any one but Violet Effingham.
There had been so much to make such a marriage desirable! I should
wrong my hero deeply were I to say that the weight of his sorrow was
occasioned by the fact that he had lost an heiress. He would never
have thought of looking for Violet Effingham had he not first learned
to love her. But as the idea opened itself out to him, everything
had seemed to be so suitable. Had Miss Effingham become his wife,
the mouths of the Lows and of the Bunces would have been stopped
altogether. Mr. Monk would have come to his house as his familiar
guest, and he would have been connected with half a score of peers.
A seat in Parliament would be simply his proper place, and even
Under-Secretaryships of State might soon come to be below him. He
was playing a great game, but hitherto he had played it with so much
success,--with such wonderful luck! that it had seemed to him that
all things were within his reach. Nothing more had been wanting to
him than Violet's hand for his own comfort, and Violet's fortune to
support his position; and these, too, had almost seemed to be within
his grasp. His goddess had indeed refused him,--but not with disdain.
Even Lady Laura had talked of his marriage as not improbable. All the
world, almost, had heard of the duel; and all the world had smiled,
and seemed to think that in the real fight Phineas Finn would be
the victor,--that the lucky pistol was in his hands. It had never
occurred to any one to suppose,--as far as he could see,--that he was
presuming at all, or pushing himself out of his own sphere, in asking
Violet Effingham to be his wife. No;--he would trust his luck, would
persevere, and would succeed. Such had been his resolution on that
very morning,--and now there had come this letter to dash him to the
ground.
There were moments in which he declared to himself that he would not
believe the letter,--not that there was any moment in which there
was in his mind the slightest spark of real hope. But he would tell
himself that he would still persevere. Violet might have been driven
to accept that violent man by violent influence,--or it might be
that she had not in truth accepted him, that Chiltern had simply so
asserted. Or, even if it were so, did women never change their minds?
The manly thing would be to persevere to the end. Had he not before
been successful, when success seemed to be as far from him? But he
could buoy himself up with no real hope. Even when these ideas were
present to his mind, he knew,--he knew well,--at those very moments,
that his back was broken.
Some one had come in and lighted the candles and drawn down the
blinds while he was sitting there, and now, as he looked at his
watch, he found that it was past five o'clock. He was engaged to dine
with Madame Max Goesler at eight, and in his agony he half-resolved
that he would send an excuse. Madame Max would be full of wrath, as
she was very particular about her little dinner-parties;--but, what
did he care now about the wrath of Madame Max Goesler? And yet only
this morning he had been congratulating himself, among his other
successes, upon her favour, and had laughed inwardly at his own
falseness,--his falseness to Violet Effingham,--as he did so. He
had said something to himself jocosely about lovers' perjuries, the
remembrance of which was now very bitter to him. He took up a sheet
of note-paper and scrawled an excuse to Madame Goesler. News from the
country, he said, made it impossible that he should go out to-night.
But he did not send the note. At about half-past five he opened the
door of his private secretary's room and found the young man fast
asleep, with a cigar in his mouth. "Halloa, Charles," he said.
"All right!" Charles Standish was a first cousin of Lady Laura's,
and, having been in the office before Phineas had joined it, and
being a great favourite with his cousin, had of course become the
Under-Secretary's private secretary. "I'm all here," said Charles
Standish, getting up and shaking himself.
"I am going. Just tie up those papers,--exactly as they are. I shall
be here early to-morrow, but I shan't want you before twelve. Good
night, Charles."
"Ta, ta," said his private secretary, who was very fond of his
master, but not very respectful,--unless upon express occasions.
Then Phineas went out and walked across the park; but as he went he
became quite aware that his back was broken. It was not the less
broken because he sang to himself little songs to prove to himself
that it was whole and sound. It was broken, and it seemed to him now
that he never could become an Atlas again, to bear the weight of the
world upon his shoulders. What did anything signify? All that he had
done had been part of a game which he had been playing throughout,
and now he had been beaten in his game. He absolutely ignored his
old passion for Lady Laura as though it had never been, and regarded
himself as a model of constancy,--as a man who had loved, not wisely
perhaps, but much too well,--and who must now therefore suffer a
living death. He hated Parliament. He hated the Colonial Office.
He hated his friend Mr. Monk; and he especially hated Madame Max
Goesler. As to Lord Chiltern,--he believed that Lord Chiltern had
obtained his object by violence. He would see to that! Yes;--let the
consequences be what they might, he would see to that!
He went up by the Duke of York's column, and as he passed the
Athenæum he saw his chief, Lord Cantrip, standing under the portico
talking to a bishop. He would have gone on unnoticed, had it been
possible; but Lord Cantrip came down to him at once. "I have put your
name down here," said his lordship.
"What's the use?" said Phineas, who was profoundly indifferent at
this moment to all the clubs in London.
"It can't do any harm, you know. You'll come up in time. And if you
should get into the ministry, they'll let you in at once."
"Ministry!" ejaculated Phineas. But Lord Cantrip took the tone of
voice as simply suggestive of humility, and suspected nothing of that
profound indifference to all ministers and ministerial honours which
Phineas had intended to express. "By-the-bye," said Lord Cantrip,
putting his arm through that of the Under-Secretary, "I wanted to
speak to you about the guarantees. We shall be in the devil's own
mess, you know--" And so the Secretary of State went on about the
Rocky Mountain Railroad, and Phineas strove hard to bear his burden
with his broken back. He was obliged to say something about the
guarantees, and the railway, and the frozen harbour,--and something
especially about the difficulties which would be found, not in the
measures themselves, but in the natural pugnacity of the Opposition.
In the fabrication of garments for the national wear, the great
thing is to produce garments that shall, as far as possible, defy
hole-picking. It may be, and sometimes is, the case, that garments
so fabricated will be good also for wear. Lord Cantrip, at the
present moment, was very anxious and very ingenious in the stopping
of holes; and he thought that perhaps his Under-Secretary was too
much prone to the indulgence of large philanthropical views without
sufficient thought of the hole-pickers. But on this occasion, by
the time that he reached Brooks's, he had been enabled to convince
his Under-Secretary, and though he had always thought well of his
Under-Secretary, he thought better of him now than ever he had done.
Phineas during the whole time had been meditating what he could do
to Lord Chiltern when they two should meet. Could he take him by the
throat and smite him? "I happen to know that Broderick is working as
hard at the matter as we are," said Lord Cantrip, stopping opposite
to the club. "He moved for papers, you know, at the end of last
session." Now Mr. Broderick was a gentleman in the House looking for
promotion in a Conservative Government, and of course would oppose
any measure that could be brought forward by the Cantrip-Finn
Colonial Administration. Then Lord Cantrip slipped into the club, and
Phineas went on alone.
A spark of his old ambition with reference to Brooks's was the first
thing to make him forget his misery for a moment. He had asked Lord
Brentford to put his name down, and was not sure whether it had been
done. The threat of Mr. Broderick's opposition had been of no use
towards the strengthening of his broken back, but the sight of Lord
Cantrip hurrying in at the coveted door did do something. "A man
can't cut his throat or blow his brains out," he said to himself;
"after all, he must go on and do his work. For hearts will break, yet
brokenly live on." Thereupon he went home, and after sitting for an
hour over his own fire, and looking wistfully at a little treasure
which he had,--a treasure obtained by some slight fraud at Saulsby,
and which he now chucked into the fire, and then instantly again
pulled out of it, soiled but unscorched,--he dressed himself for
dinner, and went out to Madame Max Goesler's. Upon the whole, he was
glad that he had not sent the note of excuse. A man must live, even
though his heart be broken, and living he must dine.
Madame Max Goesler was fond of giving little dinners at this period
of the year, before London was crowded, and when her guests might
probably not be called away by subsequent social arrangements. Her
number seldom exceeded six or eight, and she always spoke of these
entertainments as being of the humblest kind. She sent out no big
cards. She preferred to catch her people as though by chance, when
that was possible. "Dear Mr. Jones. Mr. Smith is coming to tell
me about some sherry on Tuesday. Will you come and tell me too? I
daresay you know as much about it." And then there was a studious
absence of parade. The dishes were not very numerous. The bill of
fare was simply written out once, for the mistress, and so circulated
round the table. Not a word about the things to be eaten or the
things to be drunk was ever spoken at the table,--or at least no such
word was ever spoken by Madame Goesler. But, nevertheless, they who
knew anything about dinners were aware that Madame Goesler gave very
good dinners indeed. Phineas Finn was beginning to flatter himself
that he knew something about dinners, and had been heard to assert
that the soups at the cottage in Park Lane were not to be beaten in
London. But he cared for no soup to-day, as he slowly made his way up
Madame Goesler's staircase.
There had been one difficulty in the way of Madame Goesler's
dinner-parties which had required some patience and great ingenuity
in its management. She must either have ladies, or she must not have
them. There was a great allurement in the latter alternative; but she
knew well that if she gave way to it, all prospect of general society
would for her be closed,--and for ever. This had been in the early
days of her widowhood in Park Lane. She cared but little for women's
society; but she knew well that the society of gentlemen without
women would not be that which she desired. She knew also that she
might as effectually crush herself and all her aspirations by
bringing to her house indifferent women,--women lacking something
either in character, or in position, or in talent,--as by having none
at all. Thus there had been a great difficulty, and sometimes she had
thought that the thing could not be done at all. "These English are
so stiff, so hard, so heavy!" And yet she would not have cared to
succeed elsewhere than among the English. By degrees, however, the
thing was done. Her prudence equalled her wit, and even suspicious
people had come to acknowledge that they could not put their fingers
on anything wrong. When Lady Glencora Palliser had once dined at
the cottage in Park Lane, Madame Max Goesler had told herself that
henceforth she did not care what the suspicious people said. Since
that the Duke of Omnium had almost promised that he would come. If
she could only entertain the Duke of Omnium she would have done
everything.
But there was no Duke of Omnium there to-night. At this time the Duke
of Omnium was, of course, not in London. But Lord Fawn was there; and
our old friend Laurence Fitzgibbon, who had--resigned his place at
the Colonial Office; and there were Mr. and Mrs. Bonteen. They, with
our hero, made up the party. No one doubted for a moment to what
source Mr. Bonteen owed his dinner. Mrs. Bonteen was good-looking,
could talk, was sufficiently proper, and all that kind of thing,--and
did as well as any other woman at this time of year to keep Madame
Max Goesler in countenance. There was never any sitting after dinner
at the cottage; or, I should rather say, there was never any sitting
after Madame Goesler went; so that the two ladies could not weary
each other by being alone together. Mrs. Bonteen understood quite
well that she was not required there to talk to her hostess, and was
as willing as any woman to make herself agreeable to the gentlemen
she might meet at Madame Goesler's table. And thus Mr. and Mrs.
Bonteen not unfrequently dined in Park Lane.
"Now we have only to wait for that horrible man, Mr. Fitzgibbon,"
said Madame Max Goesler, as she welcomed Phineas. "He is always
late."
"What a blow for me!" said Phineas.
"No,--you are always in good time. But there is a limit beyond which
good time ends, and being shamefully late at once begins. But here he
is." And then, as Laurence Fitzgibbon entered the room, Madame
Goesler rang the bell for dinner.
Phineas found himself placed between his hostess and Mr. Bonteen, and
Lord Fawn was on the other side of Madame Goesler. They were hardly
seated at the table before some one stated it as a fact that Lord
Brentford and his son were reconciled. Now Phineas knew, or thought
that he knew, that this could not as yet be the case; and indeed such
was not the case, though the father had already received the son's
letter. But Phineas did not choose to say anything at present about
Lord Chiltern.
"How odd it is," said Madame Goesler; "how often you English fathers
quarrel with your sons!"
"How often we English sons quarrel with our fathers rather," said
Lord Fawn, who was known for the respect he had always paid to the
fifth commandment.
"It all comes from entail and primogeniture, and old-fashioned
English prejudices of that kind," said Madame Goesler. "Lord Chiltern
is a friend of yours, Mr. Finn, I think."
"They are both friends of mine," said Phineas.
"Ah, yes; but you,--you,--you and Lord Chiltern once did something
odd together. There was a little mystery, was there not?"
"It is very little of a mystery now," said Fitzgibbon.
"It was about a lady;--was it not?" said Mrs. Bonteen, affecting to
whisper to her neighbour.
"I am not at liberty to say anything on the subject," said
Fitzgibbon; "but I have no doubt Phineas will tell you."
"I don't believe this about Lord Brentford," said Mr. Bonteen. "I
happen to know that Chiltern was down at Loughlinter three days ago,
and that he passed through London yesterday on his way to the place
where he hunts. The Earl is at Saulsby. He would have gone to Saulsby
if it were true."
"It all depends upon whether Miss Effingham will accept him," said
Mrs. Bonteen, looking over at Phineas as she spoke.
As there were two of Violet Effingham's suitors at table, the subject
was becoming disagreeably personal; and the more so, as every one of
the party knew or surmised something of the facts of the case. The
cause of the duel at Blankenberg had become almost as public as the
duel, and Lord Fawn's courtship had not been altogether hidden from
the public eye. He on the present occasion might probably be able to
carry himself better than Phineas, even presuming him to be equally
eager in his love,--for he knew nothing of the fatal truth. But he
was unable to hear Mrs. Bonteen's statement with indifference, and
showed his concern in the matter by his reply. "Any lady will be much
to be pitied," he said, "who does that. Chiltern is the last man in
the world to whom I would wish to trust the happiness of a woman for
whom I cared."
"Chiltern is a very good fellow," said Laurence Fitzgibbon.
"Just a little wild," said Mrs. Bonteen.
"And never had a shilling in his pocket in his life," said her
husband.
"I regard him as simply a madman," said Lord Fawn.
"I do so wish I knew him," said Madame Max Goesler. "I am fond of
madmen, and men who haven't shillings, and who are a little wild,
Could you not bring him here, Mr. Finn?"
Phineas did not know what to say, or how to open his mouth without
showing his deep concern. "I shall be happy to ask him if you wish
it," he replied, as though the question had been put to him in
earnest; "but I do not see so much of Lord Chiltern as I used to do."
"You do not believe that Violet Effingham will accept him?" asked
Mrs. Bonteen.
He paused a moment before he spoke, and then made his answer in a
deep solemn voice,--with a seriousness which he was unable to
repress. "She has accepted him," he said.
"Do you mean that you know it?" said Madame Goesler.
"Yes;--I mean that I know it."
Had anybody told him beforehand that he would openly make this
declaration at Madame Goesler's table, he would have said that of
all things it was the most impossible. He would have declared that
nothing would have induced him to speak of Violet Effingham in his
existing frame of mind, and that he would have had his tongue cut
out before he spoke of her as the promised bride of his rival. And
now he had declared the whole truth of his own wretchedness and
discomfiture. He was well aware that all of them there knew why he
had fought the duel at Blankenberg;--all, that is, except perhaps
Lord Fawn. And he felt as he made the statement as to Lord Chiltern
that he blushed up to his forehead, and that his voice was strange,
and that he was telling the tale of his own disgrace. But when the
direct question had been asked him he had been unable to refrain from
answering it directly. He had thought of turning it off with some
jest or affectation of drollery, but had failed. At the moment he had
been unable not to speak the truth.
"I don't believe a word of it," said Lord Fawn,--who also forgot
himself.
"I do believe it, if Mr. Finn says so," said Mrs. Bonteen, who rather
liked the confusion she had caused.
"But who could have told you, Finn?" asked Mr. Bonteen.
"His sister, Lady Laura, told me so," said Phineas.
"Then it must be true," said Madame Goesler.
"It is quite impossible," said Lord Fawn. "I think I may say that
I know that it is impossible. If it were so, it would be a most
shameful arrangement. Every shilling she has in the world would
be swallowed up." Now, Lord Fawn in making his proposals had been
magnanimous in his offers as to settlements and pecuniary provisions
generally.
For some minutes after that Phineas did not speak another word, and
the conversation generally was not so brisk and bright as it was
expected to be at Madame Goesler's. Madame Max Goesler herself
thoroughly understood our hero's position, and felt for him. She
would have encouraged no questionings about Violet Effingham had
she thought that they would have led to such a result, and now she
exerted herself to turn the minds of her guests to other subjects.
At last she succeeded; and after a while, too, Phineas himself was
able to talk. He drank two or three glasses of wine, and dashed
away into politics, taking the earliest opportunity in his power of
contradicting Lord Fawn very plainly on one or two matters. Laurence
Fitzgibbon was of course of opinion that the ministry could not stay
in long. Since he had left the Government the ministers had made
wonderful mistakes, and he spoke of them quite as an enemy might
speak. "And yet, Fitz," said Mr. Bonteen, "you used to be so staunch
a supporter."
"I have seen the error of my way, I can assure you," said Laurence.
"I always observe," said Madame Max Goesler, "that when any of
you gentlemen resign,--which you usually do on some very trivial
matter,--the resigning gentleman becomes of all foes the bitterest.
Somebody goes on very well with his friends, agreeing most cordially
about everything, till he finds that his public virtue cannot swallow
some little detail, and then he resigns. Or some one, perhaps, on the
other side has attacked him, and in the mêlée he is hurt, and so he
resigns. But when he has resigned, and made his parting speech full
of love and gratitude, I know well after that where to look for the
bitterest hostility to his late friends. Yes, I am beginning to
understand the way in which politics are done in England."
All this was rather severe upon Laurence Fitzgibbon; but he was a man
of the world, and bore it better than Phineas had borne his defeat.
The dinner, taken altogether, was not a success, and so Madame
Goesler understood. Lord Fawn, after he had been contradicted by
Phineas, hardly opened his mouth. Phineas himself talked rather too
much and rather too loudly; and Mrs. Bonteen, who was well enough
inclined to flatter Lord Fawn, contradicted him. "I made a mistake,"
said Madame Goesler afterwards, "in having four members of Parliament
who all of them were or had been in office. I never will have two men
in office together again." This she said to Mrs. Bonteen. "My dear
Madame Max," said Mrs. Bonteen, "your resolution ought to be that you
will never again have two claimants for the same young lady."
In the drawing-room up-stairs Madame Goesler managed to be alone for
three minutes with Phineas Finn. "And it is as you say, my friend?"
she asked. Her voice was plaintive and soft, and there was a look of
real sympathy in her eyes. Phineas almost felt that if they two had
been quite alone he could have told her everything, and have wept at
her feet.
"Yes," he said, "it is so."
"I never doubted it when you had declared it. May I venture to say
that I wish it had been otherwise?"
"It is too late now, Madame Goesler. A man of course is a fool to
show that he has any feelings in such a matter. The fact is, I heard
it just before I came here, and had made up my mind to send you an
excuse. I wish I had now."
"Do not say that, Mr. Finn."
"I have made such an ass of myself."
"In my estimation you have done yourself honour. But if I may venture
to give you counsel, do not speak of this affair again as though you
had been personally concerned in it. In the world now-a-days the only
thing disgraceful is to admit a failure."
"And I have failed."
"But you need not admit it, Mr. Finn. I know I ought not to say as
much to you."
"I, rather, am deeply indebted to you. I will go now, Madame Goesler,
as I do not wish to leave the house with Lord Fawn."
"But you will come and see me soon." Then Phineas promised that he
would come soon; and felt as he made the promise that he would have
an opportunity of talking over his love with his new friend at any
rate without fresh shame as to his failure.
Laurence Fitzgibbon went away with Phineas, and Mr. Bonteen, having
sent his wife away by herself, walked off towards the clubs with Lord
Fawn. He was very anxious to have a few words with Lord Fawn. Lord
Fawn had evidently been annoyed by Phineas, and Mr. Bonteen did not
at all love the young Under-Secretary. "That fellow has become the
most consummate puppy I ever met," said he, as he linked himself on
to the lord, "Monk, and one or two others among them, have contrived
to spoil him altogether."
"I don't believe a word of what he said about Lord Chiltern," said
Lord Fawn.
"About his marriage with Miss Effingham?"
"It would be such an abominable shame to sacrifice the girl," said
Lord Fawn. "Only think of it. Everything is gone. The man is a
drunkard, and I don't believe he is any more reconciled to his father
than you are. Lady Laura Kennedy must have had some object in saying
so."
"Perhaps an invention of Finn's altogether," said Mr. Bonteen. "Those
Irish fellows are just the men for that kind of thing."
"A man, you know, so violent that nobody can hold him," said Lord
Fawn, thinking of Chiltern.
"And so absurdly conceited," said Mr. Bonteen, thinking of Phineas.
"A man who has never done anything, with all his advantages in the
world,--and never will."
"He won't hold his place long," said Mr. Bonteen.
"Whom do you mean?"
"Phineas Finn."
"Oh, Mr. Finn. I was talking of Lord Chiltern. I believe Finn to be
a very good sort of a fellow, and he is undoubtedly clever. They say
Cantrip likes him amazingly. He'll do very well. But I don't believe
a word of this about Lord Chiltern." Then Mr. Bonteen felt himself to
be snubbed, and soon afterwards left Lord Fawn alone.
CHAPTER LIV
Consolation
On the day following Madame Goesler's dinner party, Phineas, though
he was early at his office, was not able to do much work, still
feeling that as regarded the realities of the world, his back
was broken. He might no doubt go on learning, and, after a time,
might be able to exert himself in a perhaps useful, but altogether
uninteresting kind of way, doing his work simply because it was
there to be done,--as the carter or the tailor does his;--and from
the same cause, knowing that a man must have bread to live. But as
for ambition, and the idea of doing good, and the love of work for
work's sake,--as for the elastic springs of delicious and beneficent
labour,--all that was over for him. He would have worked from day
till night, and from night till day, and from month till month
throughout the year to have secured for Violet Effingham the
assurance that her husband's position was worthy of her own. But now
he had no motive for such work as this. As long as he took the public
pay, he would earn it; and that was all.
On the next day things were a little better with him. He received a
note in the morning from Lord Cantrip saying that they two were to
see the Prime Minister that evening, in order that the whole question
of the railway to the Rocky Mountains might be understood, and
Phineas was driven to his work. Before the time of the meeting came
he had once more lost his own identity in great ideas of colonial
welfare, and had planned and peopled a mighty region on the Red
River, which should have no sympathy with American democracy. When
he waited upon Mr. Gresham in the afternoon he said nothing about
the mighty region; indeed, he left it to Lord Cantrip to explain
most of the proposed arrangements,--speaking only a word or two here
and there as occasion required. But he was aware that he had so far
recovered as to be able to save himself from losing ground during the
interview.
"He's about the first Irishman we've had that has been worth his
salt," said Mr. Gresham to his colleague afterwards.
"That other Irishman was a terrible fellow," said Lord Cantrip,
shaking his head.
On the fourth day after his sorrow had befallen him, Phineas went
again to the cottage in Park Lane. And in order that he might not be
balked in his search for sympathy he wrote a line to Madame Goesler
to ask if she would be at home. "I will be at home from five to
six,--and alone.--M. M. G." That was the answer from Marie Max
Goesler, and Phineas was of course at the cottage a few minutes
after five. It is not, I think, surprising that a man when he wants
sympathy in such a calamity as that which had now befallen Phineas
Finn, should seek it from a woman. Women sympathise most effectually
with men, as men do with women. But it is, perhaps, a little odd that
a man when he wants consolation because his heart has been broken,
always likes to receive it from a pretty woman. One would be disposed
to think that at such a moment he would be profoundly indifferent
to such a matter, that no delight could come to him from female
beauty, and that all he would want would be the softness of a simply
sympathetic soul. But he generally wants a soft hand as well, and an
eye that can be bright behind the mutual tear, and lips that shall
be young and fresh as they express their concern for his sorrow. All
these things were added to Phineas when he went to Madame Goesler in
his grief.
"I am so glad to see you," said Madame Max.
"You are very good-natured to let me come."
"No;--but it is so good of you to trust me. But I was sure you would
come after what took place the other night. I saw that you were
pained, and I was so sorry for it."
"I made such a fool of myself."
"Not at all. And I thought that you were right to tell them when the
question had been asked. If the thing was not to be kept a secret, it
was better to speak it out. You will get over it quicker in that way
than in any other. I have never seen the young lord, myself."
"Oh, there is nothing amiss about him. As to what Lord Fawn said, the
half of it is simply exaggeration, and the other half is
misunderstood."
"In this country it is so much to be a lord," said Madame Goesler.
Phineas thought a moment of that matter before he replied. All the
Standish family had been very good to him, and Violet Effingham had
been very good. It was not the fault of any of them that he was now
wretched and back-broken. He had meditated much on this, and had
resolved that he would not even think evil of them. "I do not in my
heart believe that that has had anything to do with it," he said.
"But it has, my friend,--always. I do not know your Violet
Effingham."
"She is not mine."
"Well;--I do not know this Violet that is not yours. I have met her,
and did not specially admire her. But then the tastes of men and
women about beauty are never the same. But I know she is one that
always lives with lords and countesses. A girl who always lived with
countesses feels it to be hard to settle down as a plain Mistress."
"She has had plenty of choice among all sorts of men. It was not the
title. She would not have accepted Chiltern unless she had--. But
what is the use of talking of it?"
"They had known each other long?"
"Oh, yes,--as children. And the Earl desired it of all things."
"Ah;--then he arranged it."
"Not exactly. Nobody could arrange anything for Chiltern,--nor, as
far as that goes, for Miss Effingham. They arranged it themselves, I
fancy."
"You had asked her?"
"Yes;--twice. And she had refused him more than twice. I have nothing
for which to blame her; but yet I had thought,--I had thought--"
"She is a jilt then?"
"No;--I will not let you say that of her. She is no jilt. But I think
she has been strangely ignorant of her own mind. What is the use of
talking of it, Madame Goesler?"
"None;--only sometimes it is better to speak a word, than to keep
one's sorrow to oneself."
"So it is;--and there is not one in the world to whom I can speak
such a word, except yourself. Is not that odd? I have sisters, but
they have never heard of Miss Effingham, and would be quite
indifferent."
"Perhaps they have some other favourites."
"Ah;--well. That does not matter, And my best friend here in London
is Lord Chiltern's own sister."
"She knew of your attachment?"
"Oh, yes."
"And she told you of Miss Effingham's engagement. Was she glad of
it?"
"She has always desired the marriage. And yet I think she would have
been satisfied had it been otherwise. But of course her heart must
be with her brother. I need not have troubled myself to go to
Blankenberg after all."
"It was for the best, perhaps. Everybody says you behaved so well."
"I could not but go, as things were then."
"What if you had--shot him?"
"There would have been an end of everything. She would never have
seen me after that. Indeed I should have shot myself next, feeling
that there was nothing else left for me to do."
"Ah;--you English are so peculiar. But I suppose it is best not to
shoot a man. And, Mr. Finn, there are other ladies in the world
prettier than Miss Violet Effingham. No;--of course you will not
admit that now. Just at this moment, and for a month or two, she
is peerless, and you will feel yourself to be of all men the most
unfortunate. But you have the ball at your feet. I know no one so
young who has got the ball at his feet so well. I call it nothing to
have the ball at your feet if you are born with it there. It is so
easy to be a lord if your father is one before you,--and so easy
to marry a pretty girl if you can make her a countess. But to make
yourself a lord, or to be as good as a lord, when nothing has been
born to you,--that I call very much. And there are women, and pretty
women too, Mr. Finn, who have spirit enough to understand this, and
to think that the man, after all, is more important than the lord."
Then she sang the old well-worn verse of the Scotch song with
wonderful spirit, and with a clearness of voice and knowledge of
music for which he had hitherto never given her credit.
"A prince can mak' a belted knight,
A marquis, duke, and a' that;
But an honest man's aboon his might,
Guid faith he mauna fa' that."
"I did not know that you sung, Madame Goesler."
"Only now and then when something specially requires it. And I am
very fond of Scotch songs. I will sing to you now if you like it."
Then she sang the whole song,--"A man's a man for a' that," she
said as she finished. "Even though he cannot get the special bit of
painted Eve's flesh for which his heart has had a craving." Then she
sang again:--
"There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far,
Who would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar."
"But young Lochinvar got his bride," said Phineas.
"Take the spirit of the lines, Mr. Finn, which is true; and not the
tale as it is told, which is probably false. I often think that Jock
of Hazledean, and young Lochinvar too, probably lived to repent their
bargains. We will hope that Lord Chiltern may not do so."
"I am sure he never will."
"That is all right. And as for you, do you for a while think of your
politics, and your speeches, and your colonies, rather than of your
love. You are at home there, and no Lord Chiltern can rob you of
your success. And if you are down in the mouth, come to me, and I
will sing you a Scotch song. And, look you, the next time I ask you
to dinner I will promise you that Mrs. Bonteen shall not be here.
Good-bye." She gave him her hand, which was very soft, and left it
for a moment in his, and he was consoled.
Madame Goesler, when she was alone, threw herself on to her chair
and began to think of things. In these days she would often ask
herself what in truth was the object of her ambition, and the aim of
her life. Now at this moment she had in her hand a note from the Duke
of Omnium. The Duke had allowed himself to say something about a
photograph, which had justified her in writing to him,--or which she
had taken for such justification. And the Duke had replied. "He would
not," he said, "lose the opportunity of waiting upon her in person
which the presentation of the little gift might afford him." It would
be a great success to have the Duke of Omnium at her house,--but to
what would the success reach? What was her definite object,--or had
she any? In what way could she make herself happy? She could not say
that she was happy yet. The hours with her were too long and the days
too many.
The Duke of Omnium should come,--if he would. And she was quite
resolved as to this,--that if the Duke did come she would not be
afraid of him. Heavens and earth! What would be the feelings of such
a woman as her, were the world to greet her some fine morning as
Duchess of Omnium! Then she made up her mind very resolutely on one
subject. Should the Duke give her any opportunity she would take
a very short time in letting him know what was the extent of her
ambition.
CHAPTER LV
Lord Chiltern at Saulsby
Lord Chiltern did exactly as he said he would do. He wrote to his
father as he passed through Carlisle, and at once went on to his
hunting at Willingford. But his letter was very stiff and ungainly,
and it may be doubted whether Miss Effingham was not wrong in
refusing the offer which he had made to her as to the dictation of
it. He began his letter, "My Lord," and did not much improve the
style as he went on with it. The reader may as well see the whole
letter;--
Railway Hotel, Carlisle,
December 27, 186--.
MY LORD,
I am now on my way from Loughlinter to London, and write
this letter to you in compliance with a promise made by
me to my sister and to Miss Effingham. I have asked Violet
to be my wife, and she has accepted me, and they think
that you will be pleased to hear that this has been done.
I shall be, of course, obliged, if you will instruct Mr.
Edwards to let me know what you would propose to do in
regard to settlements. Laura thinks that you will wish to
see both Violet and myself at Saulsby. For myself, I can
only say that, should you desire me to come, I will do
so on receiving your assurance that I shall be treated
neither with fatted calves nor with reproaches. I am not
aware that I have deserved either.
I am, my lord, yours affect.,
CHILTERN.
P.S.--My address will be "The Bull, Willingford."
That last word, in which he half-declared himself to be joined in
affectionate relations to his father, caused him a world of trouble.
But he could find no term for expressing, without a circumlocution
which was disagreeable to him, exactly that position of feeling
towards his father which really belonged to him. He would have
written "yours with affection," or "yours with deadly enmity," or
"yours with respect," or "yours with most profound indifference,"
exactly in accordance with the state of his father's mind, if he had
only known what was that state. He was afraid of going beyond his
father in any offer of reconciliation, and was firmly fixed in his
resolution that he would never be either repentant or submissive
in regard to the past. If his father had wishes for the future,
he would comply with them if he could do so without unreasonable
inconvenience, but he would not give way a single point as to things
done and gone. If his father should choose to make any reference to
them, his father must prepare for battle.
The Earl was of course disgusted by the pertinacious obstinacy of his
son's letter, and for an hour or two swore to himself that he would
not answer it. But it is natural that the father should yearn for the
son, while the son's feeling for the father is of a very much weaker
nature. Here, at any rate, was that engagement made which he had
ever desired. And his son had made a step, though it was so very
unsatisfactory a step, towards reconciliation. When the old man read
the letter a second time, he skipped that reference to fatted calves
which had been so peculiarly distasteful to him, and before the
evening had passed he had answered his son as follows;--
Saulsby, December 29, 186--.
MY DEAR CHILTERN,
I have received your letter, and am truly delighted to hear that dear
Violet has accepted you as her husband. Her fortune will be very
material to you, but she herself is better than any fortune. You have
long known my opinion of her. I shall be proud to welcome her as a
daughter to my house.
I shall of course write to her immediately, and will endeavour to
settle some early day for her coming here. When I have done so, I
will write to you again, and can only say that I will endeavour to
make Saulsby comfortable to you.
Your affectionate father,
BRENTFORD.
Richards, the groom, is still here. You had perhaps better write to
him direct about your horses.
By the middle of February arrangements had all been made, and Violet
met her lover at his father's house. She in the meantime had been
with her aunt, and had undergone a good deal of mild unceasing
persecution. "My dear Violet," said her aunt to her on her arrival
at Baddingham, speaking with a solemnity that ought to have been
terrible to the young lady, "I do not know what to say to you."
"Say 'how d'you do?' aunt," said Violet.
"I mean about this engagement," said Lady Baldock, with an increase
of awe-inspiring severity in her voice.
"Say nothing about it at all, if you don't like it," said Violet.
"How can I say nothing about it? How can I be silent? Or how am I to
congratulate you?"
"The least said, perhaps, the soonest mended," and Violet smiled as
she spoke.
"That is very well, and if I had no duty to perform, I would be
silent. But, Violet, you have been left in my charge. If I see you
shipwrecked in life, I shall ever tell myself that the fault has been
partly mine."
"Nay, aunt, that will be quite unnecessary. I will always admit that
you did everything in your power to--to--to--make me run straight, as
the sporting men say."
"Sporting men! Oh, Violet."
"And you know, aunt, I still hope that I shall be found to have kept
on the right side of the posts. You will find that poor Lord Chiltern
is not so black as he is painted."
"But why take anybody that is black at all?"
"I like a little shade in the picture, aunt."
"Look at Lord Fawn."
"I have looked at him."
"A young nobleman beginning a career of useful official life, that
will end in--; there is no knowing what it may end in."
"I daresay not;--but it never could have begun or ended in my being
Lady Fawn."
"And Mr. Appledom!"
"Poor Mr. Appledom. I do like Mr. Appledom. But, you see, aunt, I
like Lord Chiltern so much better. A young woman will go by her
feelings."
"And yet you refused him a dozen times."
"I never counted the times, aunt; but not quite so many as that."
The same thing was repeated over and over again during the month that
Miss Effingham remained at Baddingham, but Lady Baldock had no power
of interfering, and Violet bore her persecution bravely. Her future
husband was generally spoken of as "that violent young man," and
hints were thrown out as to the personal injuries to which his wife
might be possibly subjected. But the threatened bride only laughed,
and spoke of these coming dangers as part of the general lot of
married women. "I daresay, if the truth were known, my uncle Baldock
did not always keep his temper," she once said. Now, the truth was,
as Violet well knew, that "my uncle Baldock" had been dumb as a sheep
before the shearers in the hands of his wife, and had never been
known to do anything improper by those who had been most intimate
with him even in his earlier days. "Your uncle Baldock, miss," said
the outraged aunt, "was a nobleman as different in his manner of
life from Lord Chiltern as chalk from cheese." "But then comes the
question, which is the cheese?" said Violet. Lady Baldock would not
argue the question any further, but stalked out of the room.
Lady Laura Kennedy met them at Saulsby, having had something of a
battle with her husband before she left her home to do so. When she
told him of her desire to assist at this reconciliation between her
father and brother, he replied by pointing out that her first duty
was at Loughlinter, and before the interview was ended had come to
express an opinion that that duty was very much neglected. She in the
meantime had declared that she would go to Saulsby, or that she would
explain to her father that she was forbidden by her husband to do
so. "And I also forbid any such communication," said Mr. Kennedy. In
answer to which, Lady Laura told him that there were some marital
commands which she should not consider it to be her duty to obey.
When matters had come to this pass, it may be conceived that both Mr.
Kennedy and his wife were very unhappy. She had almost resolved that
she would take steps to enable her to live apart from her husband;
and he had begun to consider what course he would pursue if such
steps were taken. The wife was subject to her husband by the laws
both of God and man; and Mr. Kennedy was one who thought much of
such laws. In the meantime, Lady Laura carried her point and went to
Saulsby, leaving her husband to go up to London and begin the session
by himself.
Lady Laura and Violet were both at Saulsby before Lord Chiltern
arrived, and many were the consultations which were held between them
as to the best mode in which things might be arranged. Violet was of
opinion that there had better be no arrangement, that Lord Chiltern
should be allowed to come in and take his father's hand, and sit down
to dinner,--and that so things should fall into their places. Lady
Laura was rather in favour of some scene. But the interview had taken
place before either of them were able to say a word. Lord Chiltern,
on his arrival, had gone immediately to his father, taking the Earl
very much by surprise, and had come off best in the encounter.
"My lord," said he, walking up to his father with his hand out, "I am
very glad to come back to Saulsby." He had written to his sister to
say that he would be at Saulsby on that day, but had named no hour.
He now appeared between ten and eleven in the morning, and his father
had as yet made no preparation for him,--had arranged no appropriate
words. He had walked in at the front door, and had asked for the
Earl. The Earl was in his own morning-room,--a gloomy room, full of
dark books and darker furniture, and thither Lord Chiltern had at
once gone. The two women still were sitting together over the fire in
the breakfast-room, and knew nothing of his arrival.
"Oswald!" said his father, "I hardly expected you so early."
"I have come early. I came across country, and slept at Birmingham. I
suppose Violet is here."
"Yes, she is here,--and Laura. They will be very glad to see you. So
am I." And the father took the son's hand for the second time.
"Thank you, sir," said Lord Chiltern, looking his father full in the
face.
"I have been very much pleased by this engagement," continued the
Earl.
"What do you think I must be, then?" said the son, laughing. "I
have been at it, you know, off and on, ever so many years; and have
sometimes thought I was quite a fool not to get it out of my head.
But I couldn't get it out of my head. And now she talks as though it
were she who had been in love with me all the time!"
"Perhaps she was," said the father.
"I don't believe it in the least. She may be a little so now."
"I hope you mean that she always shall be so."
"I shan't be the worst husband in the world, I hope; and I am quite
sure I shan't be the best. I will go and see her now. I suppose I
shall find her somewhere in the house. I thought it best to see you
first."
"Stop half a moment, Oswald," said the Earl. And then Lord Brentford
did make something of a shambling speech, in which he expressed a
hope that they two might for the future live together on friendly
terms, forgetting the past. He ought to have been prepared for the
occasion, and the speech was poor and shambling. But I think that it
was more useful than it might have been, had it been uttered roundly
and with that paternal and almost majestic effect which he would have
achieved had he been thoroughly prepared. But the roundness and the
majesty would have gone against the grain with his son, and there
would have been a danger of some outbreak. As it was, Lord Chiltern
smiled, and muttered some word about things being "all right," and
then made his way out of the room. "That's a great deal better than I
had hoped," he said to himself; "and it has all come from my going in
without being announced." But there was still a fear upon him that
his father even yet might prepare a speech, and speak it, to the
great peril of their mutual comfort.
His meeting with Violet was of course pleasant enough. Now that she
had succumbed, and had told herself and had told him that she loved
him, she did not scruple to be as generous as a maiden should be who
has acknowledged herself to be conquered, and has rendered herself to
the conqueror. She would walk with him and ride with him, and take a
lively interest in the performances of all his horses, and listen to
hunting stories as long as he chose to tell them. In all this, she
was so good and so loving that Lady Laura was more than once tempted
to throw in her teeth her old, often-repeated assertions, that she
was not prone to be in love,--that it was not her nature to feel any
ardent affection for a man, and that, therefore, she would probably
remain unmarried. "You begrudge me my little bits of pleasure,"
Violet said, in answer to one such attack. "No;--but it is so odd to
see you, of all women, become so love-lorn," "I am not love-lorn,"
said Violet, "but I like the freedom of telling him everything and
of hearing everything from him, and of having him for my own best
friend. He might go away for twelve months, and I should not be
unhappy, believing, as I do, that he would be true to me." All of
which set Lady Laura thinking whether her friend had not been wiser
than she had been. She had never known anything of that sort of
friendship with her husband which already seemed to be quite
established between these two.
In her misery one day Lady Laura told the whole story of her own
unhappiness to her brother, saying nothing of Phineas Finn,--thinking
nothing of him as she told her story, but speaking more strongly
perhaps than she should have done, of the terrible dreariness of her
life at Loughlinter, and of her inability to induce her husband to
alter it for her sake.
"Do you mean that he,--ill-treats you?" said the brother, with a
scowl on his face which seemed to indicate that he would like no task
better than that of resenting such ill-treatment.
"He does not beat me, if you mean that."
"Is he cruel to you? Does he use harsh language?"
"He never said a word in his life either to me or, as I believe, to
any other human being, that he would think himself bound to regret."
"What is it then?"
"He simply chooses to have his own way, and his way cannot be my way.
He is hard, and dry, and just, and dispassionate, and he wishes me to
be the same. That is all."
"I tell you fairly, Laura, as far as I am concerned, I never could
speak to him. He is antipathetic to me. But then I am not his wife."
"I am;--and I suppose I must bear it."
"Have you spoken to my father?"
"No."
"Or to Violet?"
"Yes."
"And what does she say?"
"What can she say? She has nothing to say. Nor have you. Nor, if I am
driven to leave him, can I make the world understand why I do so. To
be simply miserable, as I am, is nothing to the world."
"I could never understand why you married him."
"Do not be cruel to me, Oswald."
"Cruel! I will stick by you in any way that you wish. If you think
well of it, I will go off to Loughlinter to-morrow, and tell him that
you will never return to him. And if you are not safe from him here
at Saulsby, you shall go abroad with us. I am sure Violet would not
object. I will not be cruel to you."
But in truth neither of Lady Laura's councillors was able to give
her advice that could serve her. She felt that she could not leave
her husband without other cause than now existed, although she felt,
also, that to go back to him was to go back to utter wretchedness.
And when she saw Violet and her brother together there came to her
dreams of what might have been her own happiness had she kept herself
free from those terrible bonds in which she was now held a prisoner.
She could not get out of her heart the remembrance of that young man
who would have been her lover, if she would have let him,--of whose
love for herself she had been aware before she had handed herself
over as a bale of goods to her unloved, unloving husband. She had
married Mr. Kennedy because she was afraid that otherwise she might
find herself forced to own that she loved that other man who was
then a nobody;--almost nobody. It was not Mr. Kennedy's money that
had bought her. This woman in regard to money had shown herself
to be as generous as the sun. But in marrying Mr. Kennedy she had
maintained herself in her high position, among the first of her own
people,--among the first socially and among the first politically.
But had she married Phineas,--had she become Lady Laura Finn,--there
would have been a great descent. She could not have entertained the
leading men of her party. She would not have been on a level with the
wives and daughters of Cabinet Ministers. She might, indeed, have
remained unmarried! But she knew that had she done so,--had she so
resolved,--that which she called her fancy would have been too strong
for her. She would not have remained unmarried. At that time it was
her fate to be either Lady Laura Kennedy or Lady Laura Finn. And she
had chosen to be Lady Laura Kennedy. To neither Violet Effingham nor
to her brother could she tell one half of the sorrow which afflicted
her.
"I shall go back to Loughlinter," she said to her brother.
"Do not, unless you wish it," he answered.
"I do not wish it. But I shall do it. Mr. Kennedy is in London now,
and has been there since Parliament met, but he will be in Scotland
again in March, and I will go and meet him there. I told him that I
would do so when I left."
"But you will go up to London?"
"I suppose so. I must do as he tells me, of course. What I mean is, I
will try it for another year."
"If it does not succeed, come to us."
"I cannot say what I will do. I would die if I knew how. Never be a
tyrant, Oswald; or at any rate, not a cold tyrant. And remember this,
there is no tyranny to a woman like telling her of her duty. Talk of
beating a woman! Beating might often be a mercy."
Lord Chiltern remained ten days at Saulsby, and at last did not get
away without a few unpleasant words with his father,--or without a
few words that were almost unpleasant with his mistress. On his first
arrival he had told his sister that he should go on a certain day,
and some intimation to this effect had probably been conveyed to the
Earl. But when his son told him one evening that the post-chaise had
been ordered for seven o'clock the next morning, he felt that his son
was ungracious and abrupt. There were many things still to be said,
and indeed there had been no speech of any account made at all as
yet.
"That is very sudden," said the Earl.
"I thought Laura had told you."
"She has not told me a word lately. She may have said something
before you came here. What is there to hurry you?"
"I thought ten days would be as long as you would care to have me
here, and as I said that I would be back by the first, I would rather
not change my plans."
"You are going to hunt?"
"Yes;--I shall hunt till the end of March."
"You might have hunted here, Oswald." But the son made no sign of
changing his plans; and the father, seeing that he would not change
them, became solemn and severe. There were a few words which he must
say to his son,--something of a speech that he must make;--so he led
the way into the room with the dark books and the dark furniture, and
pointed to a great deep arm-chair for his son's accommodation. But as
he did not sit down himself, neither did Lord Chiltern. Lord Chiltern
understood very well how great is the advantage of a standing orator
over a sitting recipient of his oratory, and that advantage he would
not give to his father. "I had hoped to have an opportunity of saying
a few words to you about the future," said the Earl.
"I think we shall be married in July," said Lord Chiltern.
"So I have heard;--but after that. Now I do not want to interfere,
Oswald, and of course the less so, because Violet's money will to
a great degree restore the inroads which have been made upon the
property."
"It will more than restore them altogether."
"Not if her estate be settled on a second son, Oswald, and I hear
from Lady Baldock that that is the wish of her relations."
"She shall have her own way,--as she ought. What that way is I do not
know. I have not even asked about it. She asked me, and I told her to
speak to you."
"Of course I should wish it to go with the family property. Of course
that would be best."
"She shall have her own way,--as far as I am concerned."
"But it is not about that, Oswald, that I would speak. What are your
plans of life when you are married?"
"Plans of life?"
"Yes;--plans of life. I suppose you have some plans. I suppose you
mean to apply yourself to some useful occupation?"
"I don't know really, sir, that I am of much use for any purpose."
Lord Chiltern laughed as he said this, but did not laugh pleasantly.
"You would not be a drone in the hive always?"
"As far as I can see, sir, we who call ourselves lords generally are
drones."
"I deny it," said the Earl, becoming quite energetic as he defended
his order. "I deny it utterly. I know no class of men who do work
more useful or more honest. Am I a drone? Have I been so from my
youth upwards? I have always worked, either in the one House or
in the other, and those of my fellows with whom I have been most
intimate have worked also. The same career is open to you."
"You mean politics?"
"Of course I mean politics."
"I don't care for politics. I see no difference in parties."
"But you should care for politics, and you should see a difference in
parties. It is your duty to do so. My wish is that you should go into
Parliament."
"I can't do that, sir."
"And why not?"
"In the first place, sir, you have not got a seat to offer me.
You have managed matters among you in such a way that poor little
Loughton has been swallowed up. If I were to canvass the electors of
Smotherem, I don't think that many would look very sweet on me."
"There is the county, Oswald."
"And whom am I to turn out? I should spend four or five thousand
pounds, and have nothing but vexation in return for it. I had rather
not begin that game, and indeed I am too old for Parliament. I did
not take it up early enough to believe in it."
All this made the Earl very angry, and from these things they went
on to worse things. When questioned again as to the future, Lord
Chiltern scowled, and at last declared that it was his idea to live
abroad in the summer for his wife's recreation, and somewhere down
in the shires during the winter for his own. He would admit of no
purpose higher than recreation, and when his father again talked to
him of a nobleman's duty, he said that he knew of no other special
duty than that of not exceeding his income. Then his father made a
longer speech than before, and at the end of it Lord Chiltern simply
wished him good night. "It's getting late, and I've promised to see
Violet before I go to bed. Good-bye." Then he was off, and Lord
Brentford was left there, standing with his back to the fire.
After that Lord Chiltern had a discussion with Violet, which lasted
nearly half the night; and during the discussion she told him more
than once that he was wrong. "Such as I am you must take me, or leave
me," he said, in anger. "Nay; there is no choice now," she answered.
"I have taken you, and I will stick by you,--whether you are right or
wrong. But when I think you wrong, I shall say so." He swore to her
as he pressed her to his heart that she was the finest, grandest,
sweetest woman that ever the world had produced. But still there was
present on his palate, when he left her, the bitter taste of her
reprimand.
CHAPTER LVI
What the People in Marylebone Thought
Phineas Finn, when the session began, was still hard at work upon his
Canada bill, and in his work found some relief for his broken back.
He went into the matter with all his energy, and before the debate
came on, knew much more about the seven thousand inhabitants of some
hundreds of thousands of square miles at the back of Canada, than
he did of the people of London or of County Clare. And he found
some consolation also in the good-nature of Madame Goesler, whose
drawing-room was always open to him. He could talk freely now to
Madame Goesler about Violet, and had even ventured to tell her that
once, in old days, he had thought of loving Lady Laura Standish.
He spoke of those days as being very old; and then he perhaps said
some word to her about dear little Mary Flood Jones. I think that
there was not much in his career of which he did not say something
to Madame Goesler, and that he received from her a good deal of
excellent advice and encouragement in the direction of his political
ambition. "A man should work," she said,--"and you do work. A woman
can only look on, and admire and long. What is there that I can do?
I can learn to care for these Canadians, just because you care for
them. If it was the beavers that you told me of, I should have to
care for the beavers." Then Phineas of course told her that such
sympathy from her was all and all to him. But the reader must not
on this account suppose that he was untrue in his love to Violet
Effingham. His back was altogether broken by his fall, and he was
quite aware that such was the fact. Not as yet, at least, had come
to him any remotest idea that a cure was possible.
Early in March he heard that Lady Laura was up in town, and of course
he was bound to go to her. The information was given to him by Mr.
Kennedy himself, who told him that he had been to Scotland to fetch
her. In these days there was an acknowledged friendship between these
two, but there was no intimacy. Indeed, Mr. Kennedy was a man who
was hardly intimate with any other man. With Phineas he now and
then exchanged a few words in the lobby of the House, and when they
chanced to meet each other, they met as friends. Mr. Kennedy had no
strong wish to see again in his house the man respecting whom he had
ventured to caution his wife; but he was thoughtful; and thinking
over it all, he found it better to ask him there. No one must know
that there was any reason why Phineas should not come to his house;
especially as all the world knew that Phineas had protected him from
the garrotters. "Lady Laura is in town now," he said; "you must go
and see her before long." Phineas of course promised that he would
go.
In these days Phineas was beginning to be aware that he had
enemies,--though he could not understand why anybody should be his
enemy now that Violet Effingham had decided against him. There was
poor Laurence Fitzgibbon, indeed, whom he had superseded at the
Colonial Office, but Laurence Fitzgibbon, to give merit where merit
was due, felt no animosity against him at all. "You're welcome, me
boy; you're welcome,--as far as yourself goes. But as for the party,
bedad, it's rotten to the core, and won't stand another session.
Mind, it's I who tell you so." And the poor idle Irishman, in so
speaking, spoke the truth as well as he knew it. But the Ratlers and
the Bonteens were Finn's bitter foes, and did not scruple to let him
know that such was the case. Barrington Erle had scruples on the
subject, and in a certain mildly apologetic way still spoke well of
the young man, whom he had himself first introduced into political
life only four years since;--but there was no earnestness or
cordiality in Barrington Erle's manner, and Phineas knew that his
first staunch friend could no longer be regarded as a pillar of
support. But there was a set of men, quite as influential,--so
Phineas thought,--as the busy politicians of the club, who were very
friendly to him. These were men, generally of high position, of
steady character,--hard workers,--who thought quite as much of what
a man did in his office as what he said in the House. Lords Cantrip,
Thrift, and Fawn were of this class,--and they were all very
courteous to Phineas. Envious men began to say of him that he cared
little now for any one of the party who had not a handle to his name,
and that he preferred to live with lords and lordlings. This was hard
upon him, as the great political ambition of his life was to call Mr.
Monk his friend; and he would sooner have acted with Mr. Monk than
with any other man in the Cabinet. But though Mr. Monk had not
deserted him, there had come to be little of late in common between
the two. His life was becoming that of a parliamentary official
rather than that of a politician;--whereas, though Mr. Monk was in
office, his public life was purely political. Mr. Monk had great
ideas of his own which he intended to hold, whether by holding them
he might remain in office or be forced out of office; and he was
indifferent as to the direction which things in this respect might
take with him. But Phineas, who had achieved his declared object in
getting into place, felt that he was almost constrained to adopt
the views of others, let them be what they might. Men spoke to him,
as though his parliamentary career were wholly at the disposal of
the Government,--as though he were like a proxy in Mr. Gresham's
pocket,--with this difference, that when directed to get up and
speak on a subject he was bound to do so. This annoyed him, and he
complained to Mr. Monk; but Mr. Monk only shrugged his shoulders and
told him that he must make his choice. He soon discovered Mr. Monk's
meaning. "If you choose to make Parliament a profession,--as you have
chosen,--you can have no right even to think of independence. If the
country finds you out when you are in Parliament, and then invites
you to office, of course the thing is different. But the latter is a
slow career, and probably would not have suited you." That was the
meaning of what Mr. Monk said to him. After all, these official and
parliamentary honours were greater when seen at a distance than he
found them to be now that he possessed them. Mr. Low worked ten hours
a day, and could rarely call a day his own; but, after all, with all
this work, Mr. Low was less of a slave, and more independent, than
was he, Phineas Finn, Under-Secretary of State, the friend of Cabinet
Ministers, and Member of Parliament since his twenty-fifth year! He
began to dislike the House, and to think it a bore to sit on the
Treasury bench;--he, who a few years since had regarded Parliament
as the British heaven on earth, and who, since he had been in
Parliament, had looked at that bench with longing envious eyes.
Laurence Fitzgibbon, who seemed to have as much to eat and drink as
ever, and a bed also to lie on, could come and go in the House as he
pleased, since his--resignation.
And there was a new trouble coming. The Reform Bill for England had
passed; but now there was to be another Reform Bill for Ireland. Let
them pass what bill they might, this would not render necessary a
new Irish election till the entire House should be dissolved. But he
feared that he would be called upon to vote for the abolition of his
own borough,--and for other points almost equally distasteful to him.
He knew that he would not be consulted,--but would be called upon to
vote, and perhaps to speak; and was certain that if he did so, there
would be war between him and his constituents. Lord Tulla had already
communicated to him his ideas that, for certain excellent reasons,
Loughshane ought to be spared. But this evil was, he hoped, a distant
one. It was generally thought that, as the English Reform Bill had
been passed last year, and as the Irish bill, if carried, could not
be immediately operative, the doing of the thing might probably be
postponed to the next session.
When he first saw Lady Laura he was struck by the great change in her
look and manner. She seemed to him to be old and worn, and he judged
her to be wretched,--as she was. She had written to him to say that
she would be at her father's house on such and such a morning, and
he had gone to her there. "It is of no use your coming to Grosvenor
Place," she said. "I see nobody there, and the house is like a
prison." Later in the interview she told him not to come and dine
there, even though Mr. Kennedy should ask him.
"And why not?" he demanded.
"Because everything would be stiff, and cold, and uncomfortable. I
suppose you do not wish to make your way into a lady's house if she
asks you not." There was a sort of smile on her face as she said
this, but he could perceive that it was a very bitter smile. "You can
easily excuse yourself."
"Yes, I can excuse myself."
"Then do so. If you are particularly anxious to dine with Mr.
Kennedy, you can easily do so at your club." In the tone of her
voice, and the words she used, she hardly attempted to conceal her
dislike of her husband.
"And now tell me about Miss Effingham," he said.
"There is nothing for me to tell."
"Yes there is;--much to tell. You need not spare me. I do not pretend
to deny to you that I have been hit hard,--so hard, that I have been
nearly knocked down; but it will not hurt me now to hear of it all.
Did she always love him?"
"I cannot say. I think she did after her own fashion."
"I sometimes think women would be less cruel," he said, "if they knew
how great is the anguish they can cause."
"Has she been cruel to you?"
"I have nothing to complain of. But if she loved Chiltern, why did
she not tell him so at once? And why--"
"This is complaining, Mr. Finn."
"I will not complain. I would not even think of it, if I could help
it. Are they to be married soon?"
"In July;--so they now say."
"And where will they live?"
"Ah! no one can tell. I do not think that they agree as yet as to
that. But if she has a strong wish Oswald will yield to it. He was
always generous."
"I would not even have had a wish,--except to have her with me."
There was a pause for a moment, and then Lady Laura answered him with
a touch of scorn in her voice,--and with some scorn, too, in her
eye:--"That is all very well, Mr. Finn; but the season will not be
over before there is some one else."
"There you wrong me."
"They tell me that you are already at Madame Goesler's feet."
"Madame Goesler!"
"What matters who it is as long as she is young and pretty, and
has the interest attached to her of something more than ordinary
position? When men tell me of the cruelty of women, I think that no
woman can be really cruel because no man is capable of suffering. A
woman, if she is thrown aside, does suffer."
"Do you mean to tell me, then, that I am indifferent to Miss
Effingham?" When he thus spoke, I wonder whether he had forgotten
that he had ever declared to this very woman to whom he was speaking,
a passion for herself.
"Psha!"
"It suits you, Lady Laura, to be harsh to me, but you are not
speaking your thoughts."
Then she lost all control of herself, and poured out to him the real
truth that was in her. "And whose thoughts did you speak when you and
I were on the braes of Loughlinter? Am I wrong in saying that change
is easy to you, or have I grown to be so old that you can talk to me
as though those far-away follies ought to be forgotten? Was it so
long ago? Talk of love! I tell you, sir, that your heart is one in
which love can have no durable hold. Violet Effingham! There may be
a dozen Violets after her, and you will be none the worse." Then she
walked away from him to the window, and he stood still, dumb, on the
spot that he had occupied. "You had better go now," she said, "and
forget what has passed between us. I know that you are a gentleman,
and that you will forget it." The strong idea of his mind when he
heard all this was the injustice of her attack,--of the attack as
coming from her, who had all but openly acknowledged that she had
married a man whom she had not loved because it suited her to escape
from a man whom she did love. She was reproaching him now for his
fickleness in having ventured to set his heart upon another woman,
when she herself had been so much worse than fickle,--so profoundly
false! And yet he could not defend himself by accusing her. What
would she have had of him? What would she have proposed to him, had
he questioned her as to his future, when they were together on the
braes of Loughlinter? Would she not have bid him to find some one
else whom he could love? Would she then have suggested to him the
propriety of nursing his love for herself,--for her who was about
to become another man's wife,--for her after she should have become
another man's wife? And yet because he had not done so, and because
she had made herself wretched by marrying a man whom she did not
love, she reproached him!
He could not tell her of all this, so he fell back for his defence on
words which had passed between them since the day when they had met
on the braes. "Lady Laura," he said, "it is only a month or two since
you spoke to me as though you wished that Violet Effingham might be
my wife."
"I never wished it. I never said that I wished it. There are moments
in which we try to give a child any brick on the chimney top for
which it may whimper." Then there was another silence which she was
the first to break. "You had better go," she said. "I know that I
have committed myself, and of course I would rather be alone."
"And what would you wish that I should do?"
"Do?" she said. "What you do can be nothing to me."
"Must we be strangers, you and I, because there was a time in which
we were almost more than friends?"
"I have spoken nothing about myself, sir,--only as I have been drawn
to do so by your pretence of being love-sick. You can do nothing for
me,--nothing,--nothing. What is it possible that you should do for
me? You are not my father, or my brother." It is not to be supposed
that she wanted him to fall at her feet. It is to be supposed that
had he done so her reproaches would have been hot and heavy on
him; but yet it almost seemed to him as though he had no other
alternative. No!--He was not her father or her brother;--nor could he
be her husband. And at this very moment, as she knew, his heart was
sore with love for another woman. And yet he hardly knew how not to
throw himself at her feet, and swear, that he would return now and
for ever to his old passion, hopeless, sinful, degraded as it would
be.
"I wish it were possible for me to do something," he said, drawing
near to her.
"There is nothing to be done," she said, clasping her hands together.
"For me nothing. I have before me no escape, no hope, no prospect of
relief, no place of consolation. You have everything before you. You
complain of a wound! You have at least shown that such wounds with
you are capable of cure. You cannot but feel that when I hear your
wailings, I must be impatient. You had better leave me now, if you
please."
"And are we to be no longer friends?" he asked.
"As far as friendship can go without intercourse, I shall always be
your friend."
Then he went, and as he walked down to his office, so intent was he
on that which had just passed that he hardly saw the people as he
met them, or was aware of the streets through which his way led him.
There had been something in the later words which Lady Laura had
spoken that had made him feel almost unconsciously that the injustice
of her reproaches was not so great as he had at first felt it to be,
and that she had some cause for her scorn. If her case was such as
she had so plainly described it, what was his plight as compared with
hers? He had lost his Violet, and was in pain. There must be much
of suffering before him. But though Violet were lost, the world was
not all blank before his eyes. He had not told himself, even in his
dreariest moments, that there was before him "no escape, no hope, no
prospect of relief, no place of consolation." And then he began to
think whether this must in truth be the case with Lady Laura. What if
Mr. Kennedy were to die? What in such case as that would he do? In
ten or perhaps in five years time might it not be possible for him
to go through the ceremony of falling upon his knees, with stiffened
joints indeed, but still with something left of the ardour of his old
love, of his oldest love of all?
As he was thinking of this he was brought up short in his walk as he
was entering the Green Park beneath the Duke's figure, by Laurence
Fitzgibbon. "How dare you not be in your office at such an hour as
this, Finn, me boy,--or, at least, not in the House,--or serving your
masters after some fashion?" said the late Under-Secretary.
"So I am. I've been on a message to Marylebone, to find what the
people there think about the Canadas."
"And what do they think about the Canadas in Marylebone?"
"Not one man in a thousand cares whether the Canadians prosper or
fail to prosper. They care that Canada should not go to the States,
because,--though they don't love the Canadians, they do hate the
Americans. That's about the feeling in Marylebone,--and it's
astonishing how like the Maryleboners are to the rest of the world."
"Dear me, what a fellow you are for an Under-Secretary! You've heard
the news about little Violet."
"What news?"
"She has quarrelled with Chiltern, you know."
"Who says so?"
"Never mind who says so, but they tell me it's true. Take an old
friend's advice, and strike while the iron's hot."
Phineas did not believe what he had heard, but though he did not
believe it, still the tidings set his heart beating. He would have
believed it less perhaps had he known that Laurence had just received
the news from Mrs. Bonteen.
CHAPTER LVII
The Top Brick of the Chimney
Madame Max Goesler was a lady who knew that in fighting the battles
which fell to her lot, in arranging the social difficulties which she
found in her way, in doing the work of the world which came to her
share, very much more care was necessary,--and care too about things
apparently trifling,--than was demanded by the affairs of people in
general. And this was not the case so much on account of any special
disadvantage under which she laboured, as because she was ambitious
of doing the very uttermost with those advantages which she
possessed. Her own birth had not been high, and that of her husband,
we may perhaps say, had been very low. He had been old when she had
married him, and she had had little power of making any progress till
he had left her a widow. Then she found herself possessed of money,
certainly; of wit,--as she believed; and of a something in her
personal appearance which, as she plainly told herself, she might
perhaps palm off upon the world as beauty. She was a woman who did
not flatter herself, who did not strongly believe in herself, who
could even bring herself to wonder that men and women in high
position should condescend to notice such a one as her. With all her
ambition, there was a something of genuine humility about her; and
with all the hardness she had learned there was a touch of womanly
softness which would sometimes obtrude itself upon her heart. When
she found a woman really kind to her, she would be very kind in
return. And though she prized wealth, and knew that her money was her
only rock of strength, she could be lavish with it, as though it were
dirt.
But she was highly ambitious, and she played her game with
great skill and great caution. Her doors were not open to all
callers;--were shut even to some who find but few doors closed
against them;--were shut occasionally to those whom she most
specially wished to see within them. She knew how to allure by
denying, and to make the gift rich by delaying it. We are told by the
Latin proverb that he who gives quickly gives twice; but I say that
she who gives quickly seldom gives more than half. When in the early
spring the Duke of Omnium first knocked at Madame Max Goesler's door,
he was informed that she was not at home. The Duke felt very cross as
he handed his card out from his dark green brougham,--on the panel
of which there was no blazon to tell the owner's rank. He was very
cross. She had told him that she was always at home between four and
six on a Thursday. He had condescended to remember the information,
and had acted upon it,--and now she was not at home! She was not at
home, though he had come on a Thursday at the very hour she had named
to him. Any duke would have been cross, but the Duke of Omnium was
particularly cross. No;--he certainly would give himself no further
trouble by going to the cottage in Park Lane. And yet Madame Max
Goesler had been in her own drawing-room, while the Duke was handing
out his card from the brougham below.
On the next morning there came to him a note from the cottage,--such
a pretty note!--so penitent, so full of remorse,--and, which was
better still, so laden with disappointment, that he forgave her.
MY DEAR DUKE,
I hardly know how to apologise to you, after having told
you that I am always at home on Thursdays; and I was at
home yesterday when you called. But I was unwell, and I
had told the servant to deny me, not thinking how much I
might be losing. Indeed, indeed, I would not have given
way to a silly headache, had I thought that your Grace
would have been here. I suppose that now I must not even
hope for the photograph.
Yours penitently,
MARIE M. G.
The note-paper was very pretty note-paper, hardly scented, and yet
conveying a sense of something sweet, and the monogram was small and
new, and fantastic without being grotesque, and the writing was of
that sort which the Duke, having much experience, had learned to
like,--and there was something in the signature which pleased him. So
he wrote a reply,--
DEAR MADAME MAX GOESLER,
I will call again next Thursday, or, if prevented, will
let you know.
Yours faithfully,
O.
When the green brougham drew up at the door of the cottage on the
next Thursday, Madame Goesler was at home, and had no headache.
She was not at all penitent now. She had probably studied the
subject, and had resolved that penitence was more alluring in a
letter than when acted in person. She received her guest with perfect
ease, and apologised for the injury done to him in the preceding
week, with much self-complacency. "I was so sorry when I got your
card," she said; "and yet I am so glad now that you were refused."
"If you were ill," said the Duke, "it was better."
"I was horribly ill, to tell the truth;--as pale as a death's head,
and without a word to say for myself. I was fit to see no one."
"Then of course you were right."
"But it flashed upon me immediately that I had named a day, and that
you had been kind enough to remember it. But I did not think you came
to London till the March winds were over."
"The March winds blow everywhere in this wretched island, Madame
Goesler, and there is no escaping them. Youth may prevail against
them; but on me they are so potent that I think they will succeed in
driving me out of my country. I doubt whether an old man should ever
live in England if he can help it."
The Duke certainly was an old man, if a man turned of seventy be
old;--and he was a man too who did not bear his years with hearty
strength. He moved slowly, and turned his limbs, when he did turn
them, as though the joints were stiff in their sockets. But there was
nevertheless about him a dignity of demeanour, a majesty of person,
and an upright carriage which did not leave an idea of old age as
the first impress on the minds of those who encountered the Duke of
Omnium. He was tall and moved without a stoop; and though he moved
slowly, he had learned to seem so to do because it was the proper
kind of movement for one so high up in the world as himself. And
perhaps his tailor did something for him. He had not been long under
Madame Max Goesler's eyes before she perceived that his tailor had
done a good deal for him. When he alluded to his own age and to
her youth, she said some pleasant little word as to the difference
between oak-trees and currant-bushes; and by that time she was
seated comfortably on her sofa, and the Duke was on a chair before
her,--just as might have been any man who was not a Duke.
After a little time the photograph was brought forth from his Grace's
pocket. That bringing out and giving of photographs, with the demand
for counter photographs, is the most absurd practice of the day.
"I don't think I look very nice, do I?" "Oh yes,--very nice, but a
little too old; and certainly you haven't got those spots all over
your forehead. These are the remarks which on such occasions are the
most common. It may be said that to give a photograph or to take a
photograph without the utterance of some words which would be felt by
a bystander to be absurd, is almost an impossibility. At this moment
there was no bystander, and therefore the Duke and the lady had no
need for caution. Words were spoken that were very absurd. Madame
Goesler protested that the Duke's photograph was more to her than the
photographs of all the world beside; and the Duke declared that he
would carry the lady's picture next to his heart,--I am afraid he
said for ever and ever. Then he took her hand and pressed it, and was
conscious that for a man over seventy years of age he did that kind
of thing very well.
"You will come and dine with me, Duke?" she said, when he began to
talk of going.
"I never dine out."
"That is just the reason you should dine with me. You shall meet
nobody you do not wish to meet."
"I would so much rather see you in this way,--I would indeed. I do
dine out occasionally, but it is at big formal parties, which I
cannot escape without giving offence."
"And you cannot escape my little not formal party,--without giving
offence." She looked into his face as she spoke, and he knew that she
meant it. And he looked into hers, and thought that her eyes were
brighter than any he was in the habit of seeing in these latter days.
"Name your own day, Duke. Will a Sunday suit you?"
"If I must come--"
"You must come." As she spoke her eyes sparkled more and more, and
her colour went and came, and she shook her curls till they emitted
through the air the same soft feeling of a perfume that her note had
produced. Then her foot peeped out from beneath the black and yellow
drapery of her dress, and the Duke saw that it was perfect. And she
put out her finger and touched his arm as she spoke. Her hand was
very fair, and her fingers were bright with rich gems. To men such as
the Duke, a hand, to be quite fair, should be bright with rich gems.
"You must come," she said,--not imploring him now but commanding him.
"Then I will come," he answered, and a certain Sunday was fixed.
The arranging of the guests was a little difficulty, till Madame
Goesler begged the Duke to bring with him Lady Glencora Palliser,
his nephew's wife. This at last he agreed to do. As the wife of his
nephew and heir, Lady Glencora was to the Duke all that a woman could
be. She was everything that was proper as to her own conduct, and not
obtrusive as to his. She did not bore him, and yet she was attentive.
Although in her husband's house she was a fierce politician, in his
house she was simply an attractive woman. "Ah; she is very clever,"
the Duke once said, "she adapts herself. If she were to go from any
one place to any other, she would be at home in both." And the
movement of his Grace's hand as he spoke seemed to indicate the
widest possible sphere for travelling and the widest possible
scope for adaptation. The dinner was arranged, and went off very
pleasantly. Madame Goesler's eyes were not quite so bright as they
were during that morning visit, nor did she touch her guest's arm in
a manner so alluring. She was very quiet, allowing her guests to do
most of the talking. But the dinner and the flowers and the wine were
excellent, and the whole thing was so quiet that the Duke liked it.
"And now you must come and dine with me," the Duke said as he took
his leave. "A command to that effect will be one which I certainly
shall not disobey," whispered Madame Goesler.
"I am afraid he is going to get fond of that woman." These words
were spoken early on the following morning by Lady Glencora to her
husband, Mr. Palliser.
"He is always getting fond of some woman, and he will to the end,"
said Mr. Palliser.
"But this Madame Max Goesler is very clever."
"So they tell me. I have generally thought that my uncle likes
talking to a fool the best."
"Every man likes a clever woman the best," said Lady Glencora, "if
the clever woman only knows how to use her cleverness."
"I'm sure I hope he'll be amused," said Mr. Palliser innocently. "A
little amusement is all that he cares for now."
"Suppose you were told some day that he was going--to be married?"
said Lady Glencora.
"My uncle married!"
"Why not he as well as another?"
"And to Madame Goesler?"
"If he be ever married it will be to some such woman."
"There is not a man in all England who thinks more of his own
position than my uncle," said Mr. Palliser somewhat proudly,--almost
with a touch of anger.
"That is all very well, Plantagenet, and true enough in a kind of
way. But a child will sacrifice all that it has for the top brick
of the chimney, and old men sometimes become children. You would
not like to be told some morning that there was a little Lord
Silverbridge in the world." Now the eldest son of the Duke of
Omnium, when the Duke of Omnium had a son, was called the Earl of
Silverbridge; and Mr. Palliser, when this question was asked him,
became very pale. Mr. Palliser knew well how thoroughly the cunning
of the serpent was joined to the purity of the dove in the person
of his wife, and he was sure that there was cause for fear when she
hinted at danger.
"Perhaps you had better keep your eye upon him," he said to his wife.
"And upon her," said Lady Glencora.
When Madame Goesler dined at the Duke's house in St. James's Square
there was a large party, and Lady Glencora knew that there was no
need for apprehension then. Indeed Madame Goesler was no more than
any other guest, and the Duke hardly spoke to her. There was a
Duchess there,--the Duchess of St. Bungay, and old Lady Hartletop,
who was a dowager marchioness,--an old lady who pestered the Duke
very sorely,--and Madame Max Goesler received her reward, and knew
that she was receiving it, in being asked to meet these people. Would
not all these names, including her own, be blazoned to the world in
the columns of the next day's _Morning Post_? There was no absolute
danger here, as Lady Glencora knew; and Lady Glencora, who was
tolerant and begrudged nothing to Madame Max except the one thing,
was quite willing to meet the lady at such a grand affair as this.
But the Duke, even should he become ever so childish a child in his
old age, still would have that plain green brougham at his command,
and could go anywhere in that at any hour in the day. And then
Madame Goesler was so manifestly a clever woman. A Duchess of Omnium
might be said to fill,--in the estimation, at any rate, of English
people,--the highest position in the world short of royalty. And the
reader will remember that Lady Glencora intended to be a Duchess of
Omnium herself,--unless some very unexpected event should intrude
itself. She intended also that her little boy, her fair-haired,
curly-pated, bold-faced little boy, should be Earl of Silverbridge
when the sand of the old man should have run itself out. Heavens,
what a blow would it be, should some little wizen-cheeked half-monkey
baby, with black brows, and yellow skin, be brought forward and shown
to her some day as the heir! What a blow to herself;--and what a blow
to all England! "We can't prevent it if he chooses to do it," said
her husband, who had his budget to bring forward that very night, and
who in truth cared more for his budget than he did for his heirship
at that moment. "But we must prevent it," said Lady Glencora. "If I
stick to him by the tail of his coat, I'll prevent it." At the time
when she thus spoke, the dark green brougham had been twice again
brought up at the door in Park Lane.
And the brougham was standing there a third time. It was May now, the
latter end of May, and the park opposite was beautiful with green
things, and the air was soft and balmy, as it will be sometimes even
in May, and the flowers in the balcony were full of perfume, and the
charm of London,--what London can be to the rich,--was at its height.
The Duke was sitting in Madame Goesler's drawing-room, at some
distance from her, for she had retreated. The Duke had a habit
of taking her hand, which she never would permit for above a few
seconds. At such times she would show no anger, but would retreat.
"Marie," said the Duke, "you will go abroad when the summer is over."
As an old man he had taken the privilege of calling her Marie, and
she had not forbidden it.
Yes, probably; to Vienna. I have property in Vienna you know, which
must be looked after.
"Do not mind Vienna this year. Come to Italy."
"What; in summer, Duke?"
"The lakes are charming in August. I have a villa on Como which is
empty now, and I think I shall go there. If you do not know the
Italian lakes, I shall be so happy to show them to you."
"I know them well, my lord. When I was young I was on the Maggiore
almost alone. Some day I will tell you a history of what I was in
those days."
"You shall tell it me there."
"No, my lord, I fear not. I have no villa there."
"Will you not accept the loan of mine? It shall be all your own while
you use it."
"My own,--to deny the right of entrance to its owner?"
"If it so pleases you."
"It would not please me. It would so far from please me that I will
never put myself in a position that might make it possible for me to
require to do so. No, Duke; it behoves me to live in houses of my
own. Women of whom more is known can afford to be your guests."
"Marie, I would have no other guest than you."
"It cannot be so, Duke."
"And why not?"
"Why not? Am I to be put to the blush by being made to answer such a
question as that? Because the world would say that the Duke of Omnium
had a new mistress, and that Madame Goesler was the woman. Do you
think that I would be any man's mistress;--even yours? Or do you
believe that for the sake of the softness of a summer evening on an
Italian lake, I would give cause to the tongues of the women here to
say that I was such a thing? You would have me lose all that I have
gained by steady years of sober work for the sake of a week or two of
dalliance such as that! No, Duke; not for your dukedom!"
How his Grace might have got through his difficulty had they been
left alone, cannot be told. For at this moment the door was opened,
and Lady Glencora Palliser was announced.
CHAPTER LVIII
Rara Avis in Terris
"Come and see the country and judge for yourself," said Phineas.
"I should like nothing better," said Mr. Monk.
"It has often seemed to me that men in Parliament know less about
Ireland than they do of the interior of Africa," said Phineas.
"It is seldom that we know anything accurately on any subject that
we have not made matter of careful study," said Mr. Monk, "and very
often do not do so even then. We are very apt to think that we men
and women understand one another; but most probably you know nothing
even of the modes of thought of the man who lives next door to you."
"I suppose not."
"There are general laws current in the world as to morality. 'Thou
shalt not steal,' for instance. That has necessarily been current as
a law through all nations. But the first man you meet in the street
will have ideas about theft so different from yours, that, if you
knew them as you know your own, you would say that this law and yours
were not even founded on the same principle. It is compatible with
this man's honesty to cheat you in a matter of horseflesh, with that
man's in a traffic of railway shares, with that other man's as to a
woman's fortune; with a fourth's anything may be done for a seat in
Parliament, while the fifth man, who stands high among us, and who
implores his God every Sunday to write that law on his heart, spends
every hour of his daily toil in a system of fraud, and is regarded as
a pattern of the national commerce!"
Mr. Monk and Phineas were dining together at Mr. Monk's house, and
the elder politician of the two in this little speech had recurred to
certain matters which had already been discussed between them. Mr.
Monk was becoming somewhat sick of his place in the Cabinet, though
he had not as yet whispered a word of his sickness to any living
ears; and he had begun to pine for the lost freedom of a seat below
the gangway. He had been discussing political honesty with Phineas,
and hence had come the sermon of which I have ventured to reproduce
the concluding denunciations.
Phineas was fond of such discussions and fond of holding them with
Mr. Monk,--in this matter fluttering like a moth round a candle. He
would not perceive that as he had made up his mind to be a servant
of the public in Parliament, he must abandon all idea of independent
action; and unless he did so he could be neither successful as
regarded himself, or useful to the public whom he served. Could a man
be honest in Parliament, and yet abandon all idea of independence?
When he put such questions to Mr. Monk he did not get a direct
answer. And indeed the question was never put directly. But the
teaching which he received was ever of a nature to make him uneasy.
It was always to this effect: "You have taken up the trade now, and
seem to be fit for success in it. You had better give up thinking
about its special honesty." And yet Mr. Monk would on an occasion
preach to him such a sermon as that which he had just uttered!
Perhaps there is no question more difficult to a man's mind than that
of the expediency or inexpediency of scruples in political life.
Whether would a candidate for office be more liable to rejection from
a leader because he was known to be scrupulous, or because he was
known to be the reverse?
"But putting aside the fourth commandment and all the theories, you
will come to Ireland?" said Phineas.
"I shall be delighted."
"I don't live in a castle, you know."
"I thought everybody did live in a castle in Ireland," said Mr. Monk.
"They seemed to do when I was there twenty years ago. But for myself,
I prefer a cottage."
This trip to Ireland had been proposed in consequence of certain
ideas respecting tenant-right which Mr. Monk was beginning to adopt,
and as to which the minds of politicians were becoming moved. It
had been all very well to put down Fenianism, and Ribandmen, and
Repeal,--and everything that had been put down in Ireland in the way
of rebellion for the last seventy-five years. England and Ireland
had been apparently joined together by laws of nature so fixed,
that even politicians liberal as was Mr. Monk,--liberal as was Mr.
Turnbull,--could not trust themselves to think that disunion could
be for the good of the Irish. They had taught themselves that it
certainly could not be good for the English. But if it was incumbent
on England to force upon Ireland the maintenance of the Union for her
own sake, and for England's sake, because England could not afford
independence established so close against her own ribs,--it was at
any rate necessary to England's character that the bride thus
bound in a compulsory wedlock should be endowed with all the best
privileges that a wife can enjoy. Let her at least not be a kept
mistress. Let it be bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh, if we
are to live together in the married state. Between husband and
wife a warm word now and then matters but little, if there be a
thoroughly good understanding at bottom. But let there be that good
understanding at bottom. What about this Protestant Church; and what
about this tenant-right? Mr. Monk had been asking himself these
questions for some time past. In regard to the Church, he had long
made up his mind that the Establishment in Ireland was a crying sin.
A man had married a woman whom he knew to be of a religion different
from his own, and then insisted that his wife should say that she
believed those things which he knew very well that she did not
believe. But, as Mr. Monk well knew, the subject of the Protestant
Endowments in Ireland was so difficult that it would require almost
more than human wisdom to adjust it. It was one of those matters
which almost seemed to require the interposition of some higher
power,--the coming of some apparently chance event,--to clear away
the evil; as a fire comes, and pestilential alleys are removed; as a
famine comes, and men are driven from want and ignorance and dirt to
seek new homes and new thoughts across the broad waters; as a war
comes, and slavery is banished from the face of the earth. But in
regard to tenant-right, to some arrangement by which a tenant in
Ireland might be at least encouraged to lay out what little capital
he might have in labour or money without being at once called upon to
pay rent for that outlay which was his own, as well as for the land
which was not his own,--Mr. Monk thought that it was possible that if
a man would look hard enough he might perhaps be able to see his way
as to that. He had spoken to two of his colleagues on the subject,
the two men in the Cabinet whom he believed to be the most thoroughly
honest in their ideas as public servants, the Duke and Mr. Gresham.
There was so much to be done;--and then so little was known upon the
subject! "I will endeavour to study it," said Mr. Monk. "If you can
see your way, do;" said Mr. Gresham,--"but of course we cannot bind
ourselves." "I should be glad to see it named in the Queen's speech
at the beginning of the next session," said Mr. Monk. "That is a long
way off as yet," said Mr. Gresham, laughing. "Who will be in then,
and who will be out?" So the matter was disposed of at the time, but
Mr. Monk did not abandon his idea. He rather felt himself the more
bound to cling to it because he received so little encouragement.
What was a seat in the Cabinet to him that he should on that account
omit a duty? He had not taken up politics as a trade. He had sat
far behind the Treasury bench or below the gangway for many a year,
without owing any man a shilling,--and could afford to do so again.
But it was different with Phineas Finn, as Mr. Monk himself
understood;--and, understanding this, he felt himself bound to
caution his young friend. But it may be a question whether his
cautions did not do more harm than good. "I shall be delighted," he
said, "to go over with you in August, but I do not think that if I
were you, I would take up this matter."
"And why not? You don't want to fight the battle singlehanded?"
"No; I desire no such glory, and would wish to have no better
lieutenant than you. But you have a subject of which you are really
fond, which you are beginning to understand, and in regard to which
you can make yourself useful."
"You mean this Canada business?"
"Yes;--and that will grow to other matters as regards the colonies.
There is nothing so important to a public man as that he should have
his own subject;--the thing which he understands, and in respect of
which he can make himself really useful."
"Then there comes a change."
"Yes;--and the man who has half learned how to have a ship built
without waste is sent into opposition, and is then brought back
to look after regiments, or perhaps has to take up that beautiful
subject, a study of the career of India. But, nevertheless, if you
have a subject, stick to it at any rate as long as it will stick to
you."
"But," said Phineas, "if a man takes up his own subject, independent
of the Government, no man can drive him from it."
"And how often does he do anything? Look at the annual motions which
come forward in the hands of private men,--Maynooth and the ballot
for instance. It is becoming more and more apparent every day that
all legislation must be carried by the Government, and must be
carried in obedience to the expressed wish of the people. The truest
democracy that ever had a chance of living is that which we are now
establishing in Great Britain."
"Then leave tenant-right to the people and the Cabinet. Why should
you take it up?"
Mr. Monk paused a moment or two before he replied. "If I choose to
run a-muck, there is no reason why you should follow me. I am old and
you are young. I want nothing from politics as a profession, and you
do. Moreover, you have a congenial subject where you are, and need
not disturb yourself. For myself, I tell you, in confidence, that I
cannot speak so comfortably of my own position."
"We will go and see, at any rate," said Phineas.
"Yes," said Mr. Monk, "we will go and see." And thus, in the month of
May, it was settled between them that, as soon as the session should
be over, and the incidental work of his office should allow Phineas
to pack up and be off, they two should start together for Ireland.
Phineas felt rather proud as he wrote to his father and asked
permission to bring home with him a Cabinet Minister as a visitor. At
this time the reputation of Phineas at Killaloe, as well in the minds
of the Killaloeians generally as in those of the inhabitants of the
paternal house, stood very high indeed. How could a father think that
a son had done badly when before he was thirty years of age he was
earning £2,000 a year? And how could a father not think well of a
son who had absolutely paid back certain moneys into the paternal
coffers? The moneys so repaid had not been much; but the repayment
of any such money at Killaloe had been regarded as little short of
miraculous. The news of Mr. Monk's coming flew about the town, about
the county, about the diocese, and all people began to say all good
things about the old doctor's only son. Mrs. Finn had long since
been quite sure that a real black swan had been sent forth out of
her nest. And the sisters Finn, for some time past, had felt in
all social gatherings they stood quite on a different footing than
formerly because of their brother. They were asked about in the
county, and two of them had been staying only last Easter with the
Molonys,--the Molonys of Poldoodie! How should a father and a mother
and sisters not be grateful to such a son, to such a brother, to such
a veritable black swan out of the nest! And as for dear little Mary
Flood Jones, her eyes became suffused with tears as in her solitude
she thought how much out of her reach this swan was flying. And yet
she took joy in his swanhood, and swore that she would love him
still;--that she would love him always. Might he bring home with him
to Killaloe, Mr. Monk, the Cabinet Minister! Of course he might. When
Mrs. Finn first heard of this august arrival, she felt as though she
would like to expend herself in entertaining, though but an hour, the
whole cabinet.
Phineas, during the spring, had, of course, met Mr. Kennedy
frequently in and about the House, and had become aware that Lady
Laura's husband, from time to time, made little overtures of civility
to him,--taking him now and again by the button-hole, walking home
with him as far as their joint paths allowed, and asking him once
or twice to come and dine in Grosvenor Place. These little advances
towards a repetition of the old friendship Phineas would have avoided
altogether, had it been possible. The invitation to Mr. Kennedy's
house he did refuse, feeling himself positively bound to do so by
Lady Laura's command, let the consequences be what they might. When
he did refuse, Mr. Kennedy would assume a look of displeasure and
leave him, and Phineas would hope that the work was done. Then there
would come another encounter, and the invitation would be repeated.
At last, about the middle of May, there came another note. "Dear
Finn, will you dine with us on Wednesday, the 28th? I give you a long
notice, because you seem to have so many appointments. Yours always,
Robert Kennedy." He had no alternative. He must refuse, even though
double the notice had been given. He could only think that Mr.
Kennedy was a very obtuse man and one who would not take a hint,
and hope that he might succeed at last. So he wrote an answer, not
intended to be conciliatory. "My dear Kennedy, I am sorry to say that
I am engaged on the 28th. Yours always, Phineas Finn." At this period
he did his best to keep out of Mr. Kennedy's way, and would be very
cunning in his manoeuvres that they should not be alone together.
It was difficult, as they sat on the same bench in the House,
and consequently saw each other almost every day of their lives.
Nevertheless, he thought that with a little cunning he might prevail,
especially as he was not unwilling to give so much of offence as
might assist his own object. But when Mr. Kennedy called upon him at
his office the day after he had written the above note, he had no
means of escape.
"I am sorry you cannot come to us on the 28th," Mr. Kennedy said, as
soon as he was seated.
Phineas was taken so much by surprise that all his cunning failed
him. "Well, yes," said he; "I was very sorry;--very sorry indeed."
"It seems to me, Finn, that you have had some reason for avoiding me
of late. I do not know that I have done anything to offend you."
"Nothing on earth," said Phineas.
"I am wrong, then, in supposing that anything beyond mere chance has
prevented you from coming to my house?" Phineas felt that he was in
a terrible difficulty, and he felt also that he was being rather
ill-used in being thus cross-examined as to his reasons for not going
to a gentleman's dinner. He thought that a man ought to be allowed
to choose where he would go and where he would not go, and that
questions such as these were very uncommon. Mr. Kennedy was sitting
opposite to him, looking more grave and more sour than usual;--and
now his own countenance also became a little solemn. It was
impossible that he should use Lady Laura's name, and yet he must, in
some way, let his persecuting friend know that no further invitation
would be of any use;--that there was something beyond mere chance
in his not going to Grosvenor Place. But how was he to do this? The
difficulty was so great that he could not see his way out of it. So
he sat silent with a solemn face. Mr. Kennedy then asked him another
question, which made the difficulty ten times greater. "Has my wife
asked you not to come to our house?"
It was necessary now that he should make a rush and get out of his
trouble in some way. "To tell you the truth, Kennedy, I don't think
she wants to see me there."
"That does not answer my question. Has she asked you not to come?"
"She said that which left on my mind an impression that she would
sooner that I did not come."
"What did she say?"
"How can I answer such a question as that, Kennedy? Is it fair to ask
it?"
"Quite fair,--I think."
"I think it quite unfair, and I must decline to answer it. I cannot
imagine what you expect to gain by cross-questioning me in this way.
Of course no man likes to go to a house if he does not believe that
everybody there will make him welcome."
"You and Lady Laura used to be great friends."
"I hope we are not enemies now. But things will occur that cause
friendships to grow cool."
"Have you quarrelled with her father?"
"With Lord Brentford?--no."
"Or with her brother,--since the duel I mean?"
"Upon my word and honour I cannot stand this, and I will not. I have
not as yet quarrelled with anybody; but I must quarrel with you, if
you go on in this way. It is quite unusual that a man should be put
through his facings after such a fashion, and I must beg that there
may be an end of it."
"Then I must ask Lady Laura."
"You can say what you like to your own wife of course. I cannot
hinder you."
Upon that Mr. Kennedy formally shook hands with him, in token that
there was no positive breach between them,--as two nations may still
maintain their alliance, though they have made up their minds to hate
each other, and thwart each other at every turn,--and took his leave.
Phineas, as he sat at his window, looking out into the park, and
thinking of what had passed, could not but reflect that, disagreeable
as Mr. Kennedy had been to him, he would probably make himself much
more disagreeable to his wife. And, for himself, he thought that he
had got out of the scrape very well by the exhibition of a little
mock anger.
CHAPTER LIX
The Earl's Wrath
The reader may remember that a rumour had been conveyed to
Phineas,--a rumour indeed which reached him from a source which he
regarded as very untrustworthy,--that Violet Effingham had quarrelled
with her lover. He would probably have paid no attention to the
rumour, beyond that which necessarily attached itself to any tidings
as to a matter so full of interest to him, had it not been repeated
to him in another quarter. "A bird has told me that your Violet
Effingham has broken with her lover," Madame Goesler said to him one
day. "What bird?" he asked. "Ah, that I cannot tell you. But this I
will confess to you, that these birds which tell us news are seldom
very credible,--and are often not very creditable, You must take
a bird's word for what it may be worth. It is said that they have
quarrelled. I daresay, if the truth were known, they are billing and
cooing in each other's arms at this moment."
Phineas did not like to be told of their billing and cooing,--did
not like to be told even of their quarrelling. Though they were to
quarrel, it would do him no good. He would rather that nobody should
mention their names to him;--so that his back, which had been so
utterly broken, might in process of time get itself cured. From what
he knew of Violet he thought it very improbable that, even were
she to quarrel with one lover, she would at once throw herself into
the arms of another. And he did feel, too, that there would be
some meanness in taking her, were she willing to be so taken. But,
nevertheless, these rumours, coming to him in this way from different
sources, almost made it incumbent on him to find out the truth. He
began to think that his broken back was not cured;--that perhaps,
after all, it was not in the way of being cured, And was it not
possible that there might be explanations? Then he went to work
and built castles in the air, so constructed as to admit of the
possibility of Violet Effingham becoming his wife.
This had been in April, and at that time all that he knew of Violet
was, that she was not yet in London. And he thought that he knew the
same as to Lord Chiltern. The Earl had told him that Chiltern was not
in town, nor expected in town as yet; and in saying so had seemed to
express displeasure against his son. Phineas had met Lady Baldock at
some house which he frequented, and had been quite surprised to find
himself graciously received by the old woman. She had said not a word
of Violet, but had spoken of Lord Chiltern,--mentioning his name in
bitter wrath. "But he is a friend of mine," said Phineas, smiling.
"A friend indeed! Mr. Finn. I know what sort of a friend. I don't
believe that you are his friend. I am afraid he is not worthy of
having any friend." Phineas did not quite understand from this
that Lady Baldock was signifying to him that, badly as she had
thought of him as a suitor for her niece, she would have preferred
him,--especially now when people were beginning to speak well of
him,--to that terrible young man, who, from his youth upwards, had
been to her a cause of fear and trembling. Of course it was desirable
that Violet should marry an elder son, and a peer's heir. All that
kind of thing, in Lady Baldock's eyes, was most desirable. But,
nevertheless, anything was better than Lord Chiltern. If Violet would
not take Mr. Appledom or Lord Fawn, in heaven's name let her take
this young man, who was kind, worthy, and steady, who was civilised
in his manners, and would no doubt be amenable in regard to
settlements. Lady Baldock had so far fallen in the world that she
would have consented to make a bargain with her niece,--almost any
bargain, so long as Lord Chiltern was excluded. Phineas did not quite
understand all this; but when Lady Baldock asked him to come to
Berkeley Square, he perceived that help was being proffered to him
where he certainly had not looked for help.
He was frequently with Lord Brentford, who talked to him constantly
on matters connected with his parliamentary life. After having been
the intimate friend of the daughter and of the son, it now seemed
to be his lot to be the intimate friend of the father. The Earl
had constantly discussed with him his arrangements with his son,
and had lately expressed himself as only half satisfied with such
reconciliation as had taken place. And Phineas could perceive that
from day to day the Earl was less and less satisfied. He would
complain bitterly of his son,--complain of his silence, complain of
his not coming to London, complain of his conduct to Violet, complain
of his idle indifference to anything like proper occupation; but he
had never as yet said a word to show that there had been any quarrel
between Violet and her lover, and Phineas had felt that he could not
ask the question. "Mr. Finn," said the Earl to him one morning, as
soon as he entered the room, "I have just heard a story which has
almost seemed to me to be incredible." The nobleman's manner was very
stern, and the fact that he called his young friend "Mr. Finn",
showed at once that something was wrong.
"What is it you have heard, my lord?" said Phineas.
"That you and Chiltern went over,--last year to,--Belgium, and
fought,--a duel there!"
Now it must have been the case that, in the set among which they
all lived,--Lord Brentford and his son and daughter and Phineas
Finn,--the old lord was the only man who had not heard of the duel
before this. It had even penetrated to the dull ears of Mr. Kennedy,
reminding him, as it did so, that his wife had,--told him a lie! But
it was the fact that no rumour of the duel had reached the Earl till
this morning.
"It is true," said Phineas.
"I have never been so much shocked in my life;--never. I had no idea
that you had any thought of aspiring to the hand of Miss Effingham."
The lord's voice as he said this was very stern.
"As I aspired in vain, and as Chiltern has been successful, that need
not now be made a reproach against me."
"I do not know what to think of it, Mr. Finn. I am so much surprised
that I hardly know what to say. I must declare my opinion at once,
that you behaved,--very badly."
"I do not know how much you know, my lord, and how much you do not
know; and the circumstances of the little affair do not permit me to
be explicit about them; but, as you have expressed your opinion so
openly you must allow me to express mine, and to say that, as far as
I can judge of my own actions, I did not behave badly at all."
"Do you intend to defend duelling, sir?"
"No. If you mean to tell me that a duel is of itself sinful, I have
nothing to say. I suppose it is. My defence of myself merely goes to
the manner in which this duel was fought, and the fact that I fought
it with your son."
"I cannot conceive how you can have come to my house as my guest,
and stood upon my interest for my borough, when you at the time were
doing your very best to interpose yourself between Chiltern and the
lady whom you so well knew I wished to become his wife." Phineas was
aware that the Earl must have been very much moved indeed when he
thus permitted himself to speak of "his" borough. He said nothing
now, however, though the Earl paused;--and then the angry lord
went on. "I must say that there was something,--something almost
approaching to duplicity in such conduct."
"If I were to defend myself by evidence, Lord Brentford, I should
have to go back to exact dates,--and dates not of facts which I could
verify, but dates as to my feelings which could not be verified,--and
that would be useless. I can only say that I believe I know what
the honour and truth of a gentleman demand,--even to the verge of
self-sacrifice, and that I have done nothing that ought to place my
character as a gentleman in jeopardy. If you will ask your son, I
think he will tell you the same."
"I have asked him. It was he who told me of the duel."
"When did he tell you, my lord?"
"Just now; this morning." Thus Phineas learned that Lord Chiltern was
at this moment in the house,--or at least in London.
"And did he complain of my conduct?"
"I complain of it, sir. I complain of it very bitterly. I placed the
greatest confidence in you, especially in regard to my son's affairs,
and you deceived me." The Earl was very angry, and was more angry
from the fact that this young man who had offended him, to whom he
had given such vital assistance when assistance was needed, had used
that assistance to its utmost before his sin was found out. Had
Phineas still been sitting for Loughton, so that the Earl could have
said to him, "You are now bound to retreat from this borough because
you have offended me, your patron," I think that he would have
forgiven the offender and allowed him to remain in his seat. There
would have been a scene, and the Earl would have been pacified. But
now the offender was beyond his reach altogether, having used the
borough as a most convenient stepping-stone over his difficulties,
and having so used it just at the time when he was committing this
sin. There was a good fortune about Phineas which added greatly to
the lord's wrath. And then, to tell the truth, he had not that rich
consolation for which Phineas gave him credit. Lord Chiltern had told
him that morning that the engagement between him and Violet was at an
end. "You have so preached to her, my lord, about my duties," the son
had said to his father, "that she finds herself obliged to give me
your sermons at second hand, till I can bear them no longer." But of
this Phineas knew nothing as yet. The Earl, however, was so imprudent
in his anger that before this interview was over he had told the
whole story. "Yes;--you deceived me," he continued; "and I can never
trust you again."
"Was it for me, my lord, to tell you of that which would have
increased your anger against your own son? When he wanted me to fight
was I to come, like a sneak at school, and tell you the story? I know
what you would have thought of me had I done so. And when it was over
was I to come and tell you then? Think what you yourself would have
done when you were young, and you may be quite sure that I did the
same. What have I gained? He has got all that he wanted; and you
have also got all that you wanted;--and I have helped you both. Lord
Brentford, I can put my hand on my heart and say that I have been
honest to you."
"I have got nothing that I wanted," said the Earl in his despair.
"Lord Chiltern and Miss Effingham will be man and wife."
"No;--they will not. He has quarrelled with her. He is so obstinate
that she will not bear with him."
Then it was all true, even though the rumours had reached him through
Laurence Fitzgibbon and Madame Max Goesler. "At any rate, my lord,
that has not been my fault," he said, after a moment's hesitation.
The Earl was walking up and down the room, angry with himself at his
own mistake in having told the story, and not knowing what further to
say to his visitor. He had been in the habit of talking so freely to
Phineas about his son that he could hardly resist the temptation of
doing so still; and yet it was impossible that he could swallow his
anger and continue in the same strain. "My lord," said Phineas, after
a while, "I can assure you that I grieve that you should be grieved.
I have received so much undeserved favour from your family, that I
owe you a debt which I can never pay. I am sorry that you should be
angry with me now; but I hope that a time may come when you will
think less severely of my conduct."
He was about to leave the room when the Earl stopped him. "Will you
give me your word," said the Earl, "that you will think no more of
Miss Effingham?" Phineas stood silent, considering how he might
answer this proposal, resolving that nothing should bring him to such
a pledge as that suggested while there was yet a ledge for hope to
stand on. "Say that, Mr. Finn, and I will forgive everything."
"I cannot acknowledge that I have done anything to be forgiven."
"Say that," repeated the Earl, "and everything shall be forgotten."
"There need be no cause for alarm, my lord," said Phineas. "You may
be sure that Miss Effingham will not think of me."
"Will you give me your word?"
"No, my lord;--certainly not. You have no right to ask it, and the
pursuit is open to me as to any other man who may choose to follow
it. I have hardly a vestige of a hope of success. It is barely
possible that I should succeed. But if it be true that Miss Effingham
be disengaged, I shall endeavour to find an opportunity of urging my
suit. I would give up everything that I have, my seat in Parliament,
all the ambition of my life, for the barest chance of success. When
she had accepted your son, I desisted,--of course. I have now heard,
from more sources than one, that she or he or both of them have
changed their minds. If this be so, I am free to try again." The
Earl stood opposite to him, scowling at him, but said nothing. "Good
morning, my lord."
"Good morning, sir."
"I am afraid it must be good-bye, for some long days to come."
"Good morning, sir," And the Earl as he spoke rang the bell. Then
Phineas took up his hat and departed.
As he walked away his mind filled itself gradually with various
ideas, all springing from the words which Lord Brentford had spoken.
What account had Lord Chiltern given to his father of the duel? Our
hero was a man very sensitive as to the good opinion of others, and
in spite of his bold assertion of his own knowledge of what became
a gentleman, was beyond measure solicitous that others should
acknowledge his claim at any rate to that title. He thought that he
had been generous to Lord Chiltern; and as he went back in his memory
over almost every word that had been spoken in the interview that had
just passed, he fancied that he was able to collect evidence that his
antagonist at Blankenberg had not spoken ill of him. As to the charge
of deceit which the Earl had made against him, he told himself that
the Earl had made it in anger. He would not even think hardly of the
Earl who had been so good a friend to him, but he believed in his
heart that the Earl had made the accusation out of his wrath and not
out of his judgment. "He cannot think that I have been false to him,"
Phineas said to himself. But it was very sad to him that he should
have to quarrel with all the family of the Standishes, as he could
not but feel that it was they who had put him on his feet. It seemed
as though he were never to see Lady Laura again except when they
chanced to meet in company,--on which occasions he simply bowed to
her. Now the Earl had almost turned him out of his house. And though
there had been to a certain extent a reconciliation between him and
Lord Chiltern, he in these days never saw the friend who had once put
him upon Bonebreaker; and now,--now that Violet Effingham was again
free,--how was it possible to avoid some renewal of enmity between
them? He would, however, endeavour to see Lord Chiltern at once.
And then he thought of Violet,--of Violet again free, of Violet as
again a possible wife for himself, of Violet to whom he might address
himself at any rate without any scruple as to his own unworthiness.
Everybody concerned, and many who were not concerned at all, were
aware that he had been among her lovers, and he thought that he could
perceive that those who interested themselves on the subject, had
regarded him as the only horse in the race likely to run with success
against Lord Chiltern. She herself had received his offers without
scorn, and had always treated him as though he were a favoured
friend, though not favoured as a lover. And now even Lady Baldock was
smiling upon him, and asking him to her house as though the red-faced
porter in the hall in Berkeley Square had never been ordered to
refuse him a moment's admission inside the doors. He had been very
humble in speaking of his own hopes to the Earl, but surely there
might be a chance. What if after all the little strain which he had
had in his back was to be cured after such a fashion as this! When he
got to his lodgings, he found a card from Lady Baldock, informing him
that Lady Baldock would be at home on a certain night, and that there
would be music. He could not go to Lady Baldock's on the night named,
as it would be necessary that he should be in the House;--nor did he
much care to go there, as Violet Effingham was not in town. But he
would call and explain, and endeavour to curry favour in that way.
He at once wrote a note to Lord Chiltern, which he addressed to
Portman Square. "As you are in town, can we not meet? Come and dine
with me at the ---- Club on Saturday." That was the note. After a
few days he received the following answer, dated from the Bull at
Willingford. Why on earth should Chiltern be staying at the Bull at
Willingford in May?
The old Shop at W----, Friday.
DEAR PHINEAS,
I can't dine with you, because I am down here, looking
after the cripples, and writing a sporting novel. They
tell me I ought to do something, so I am going to do that.
I hope you don't think I turned informer against you in
telling the Earl of our pleasant little meeting on the
sands. It had become necessary, and you are too much of a
man to care much for any truth being told. He was terribly
angry both with me and with you; but the fact is, he is so
blindly unreasonable that one cannot regard his anger. I
endeavoured to tell the story truly, and, so told, it
certainly should not have injured you in his estimation.
But it did. Very sorry, old fellow, and I hope you'll get
over it. It is a good deal more important to me than to
you.
Yours,
C.
There was not a word about Violet. But then it was hardly to be
expected that there should be words about Violet. It was not likely
that a man should write to his rival of his own failure. But yet
there was a flavour of Violet in the letter which would not have been
there, so Phineas thought, if the writer had been despondent. The
pleasant little meeting on the sands had been convened altogether in
respect of Violet. And the telling of the story to the Earl must have
arisen from discussions about Violet. Lord Chiltern must have told
his father that Phineas was his rival. Could the rejected suitor have
written on such a subject in such a strain to such a correspondent
if he had believed his own rejection to be certain? But then
Lord Chiltern was not like anybody else in the world, and it was
impossible to judge of him by one's experience of the motives of
others.
Shortly afterwards Phineas did call in Berkeley Square, and was shown
up at once into Lady Baldock's drawing-room. The whole aspect of the
porter's countenance was changed towards him, and from this, too, he
gathered good auguries This had surprised him; but his surprise was
far greater, when, on entering the room, he found Violet Effingham
there alone. A little fresh colour came to her face as she greeted
him, though it cannot be said that she blushed. She behaved herself
admirably, not endeavouring to conceal some little emotion at thus
meeting him, but betraying none that was injurious to her composure.
"I am so glad to see you, Mr. Finn," she said. "My aunt has just left
me, and will be back directly."
He was by no means her equal in his management of himself on the
occasion; but perhaps it may be acknowledged that his position
was the more difficult of the two. He had not seen her since her
engagement had been proclaimed to the world, and now he had heard
from a source which was not to be doubted, that it had been broken
off. Of course there was nothing to be said on that matter. He could
not have congratulated her in the one case, nor could he either
congratulate her or condole with her on the other. And yet he did not
know how to speak to her as though no such events had occurred. "I
did not know that you were in town," he said.
"I only came yesterday. I have been, you know, at Rome with the
Effinghams; and since that I have been--; but, indeed, I have been
such a vagrant that I cannot tell you of all my comings and goings.
And you,--you are hard at work!"
"Oh yes;--always."
"That is right. I wish I could be something, if it were only a stick
in waiting, or a door-keeper. It is so good to be something." Was it
some such teaching as this that had jarred against Lord Chiltern's
susceptibilities, and had seemed to him to be a repetition of his
father's sermons?
"A man should try to be something," said Phineas.
"And a woman must be content to be nothing,--unless Mr. Mill can pull
us through! And now, tell me,--have you seen Lady Laura?"
"Not lately."
"Nor Mr. Kennedy?"
"I sometimes see him in the House." The visit to the Colonial Office
of which the reader has been made aware had not at that time as yet
been made.
"I am sorry for all that," she said. Upon which Phineas smiled and
shook his head. "I am very sorry that there should be a quarrel
between you two."
"There is no quarrel."
"I used to think that you and he might do so much for each
other,--that is, of course, if you could make a friend of him."
"He is a man of whom it is very hard to make a friend," said Phineas,
feeling that he was dishonest to Mr. Kennedy in saying so, but
thinking that such dishonesty was justified by what he owed to Lady
Laura.
"Yes;--he is hard, and what I call ungenial. We won't say anything
about him,--will we? Have you seen much of the Earl?" This she asked
as though such a question had no reference whatever to Lord Chiltern.
"Oh dear,--alas, alas!"
"You have not quarrelled with him too?"
"He has quarrelled with me. He has heard, Miss Effingham, of what
happened last year, and he thinks that I was wrong."
"Of course you were wrong, Mr. Finn."
"Very likely. To him I chose to defend myself, but I certainly shall
not do so to you. At any rate, you did not think it necessary to
quarrel with me."
"I ought to have done so. I wonder why my aunt does not come." Then
she rang the bell.
"Now I have told you all about myself," said he; "you should tell me
something of yourself."
"About me? I am like the knife-grinder, who had no story to
tell,--none at least to be told. We have all, no doubt, got our
little stories, interesting enough to ourselves."
"But your story, Miss Effingham," he said, "is of such intense
interest to me." At that moment, luckily, Lady Baldock came into
the room, and Phineas was saved from the necessity of making a
declaration at a moment which would have been most inopportune.
Lady Baldock was exceedingly gracious to him, bidding Violet use her
influence to persuade him to come to the gathering. "Persuade him to
desert his work to come and hear some fiddlers!" said Miss Effingham.
"Indeed I shall not, aunt. Who can tell but what the colonies might
suffer from it through centuries, and that such a lapse of duty might
drive a province or two into the arms of our mortal enemies?"
"Herr Moll is coming," said Lady Baldock, "and so is Signor Scrubi,
and Pjinskt, who, they say, is the greatest man living on the
flageolet. Have you ever heard Pjinskt, Mr. Finn?" Phineas never had
heard Pjinskt. "And as for Herr Moll, there is nothing equal to him,
this year, at least." Lady Baldock had taken up music this season,
but all her enthusiasm was unable to shake the conscientious zeal of
the young Under-Secretary of State. At such a gathering he would have
been unable to say a word in private to Violet Effingham.
CHAPTER LX
Madame Goesler's Politics
It may be remembered that when Lady Glencora Palliser was shown into
Madame Goesler's room, Madame Goesler had just explained somewhat
forcibly to the Duke of Omnium her reasons for refusing the loan of
his Grace's villa at Como. She had told the Duke in so many words
that she did not mean to give the world an opportunity of maligning
her, and it would then have been left to the Duke to decide whether
any other arrangements might have been made for taking Madame Goesler
to Como, had he not been interrupted. That he was very anxious to
take her was certain. The green brougham had already been often
enough at the door in Park Lane to make his Grace feel that Madame
Goesler's company was very desirable,--was, perhaps, of all things
left for his enjoyment, the one thing the most desirable. Lady
Glencora had spoken to her husband of children crying for the top
brick of the chimney. Now it had come to this, that in the eyes
of the Duke of Omnium Marie Max Goesler was the top brick of the
chimney. She had more wit for him than other women,--more of that
sort of wit which he was capable of enjoying. She had a beauty which
he had learned to think more alluring than other beauty. He was sick
of fair faces, and fat arms, and free necks. Madame Goesler's eyes
sparkled as other eyes did not sparkle, and there was something
of the vagueness of mystery in the very blackness and gloss and
abundance of her hair,--as though her beauty was the beauty of some
world which he had not yet known. And there was a quickness and yet
a grace of motion about her which was quite new to him. The ladies
upon whom the Duke had of late most often smiled had been somewhat
slow,--perhaps almost heavy,--though, no doubt, graceful withal. In
his early youth he remembered to have seen, somewhere in Greece, such
a houri as was this Madame Goesler. The houri in that case had run
off with the captain of a Russian vessel engaged in the tallow trade;
but not the less was there left on his Grace's mind some dreamy
memory of charms which had impressed him very strongly when he was
simply a young Mr. Palliser, and had had at his command not so
convenient a mode of sudden abduction as the Russian captain's tallow
ship. Pressed hard by such circumstances as these, there is no
knowing how the Duke might have got out of his difficulties had not
Lady Glencora appeared upon the scene.
Since the future little Lord Silverbridge had been born, the Duke had
been very constant in his worship of Lady Glencora, and as, from year
to year, a little brother was added, thus making the family very
strong and stable, his acts of worship had increased; but with his
worship there had come of late something almost of dread,--something
almost of obedience, which had made those who were immediately
about the Duke declare that his Grace was a good deal changed. For,
hitherto, whatever may have been the Duke's weaknesses, he certainly
had known no master. His heir, Plantagenet Palliser, had been always
subject to him. His other relations had been kept at such a distance
as hardly to be more than recognised; and though his Grace no
doubt had had his intimacies, they who had been intimate with him
had either never tried to obtain ascendancy, or had failed. Lady
Glencora, whether with or without a struggle, had succeeded, and
people about the Duke said that the Duke was much changed. Mr.
Fothergill,--who was his Grace's man of business, and who was not
a favourite with Lady Glencora,--said that he was very much changed
indeed. Finding his Grace so much changed, Mr. Fothergill had made
a little attempt at dictation himself, but had receded with fingers
very much scorched in the attempt. It was indeed possible that the
Duke was becoming in the slightest degree weary of Lady Glencora's
thraldom, and that he thought that Madame Max Goesler might be more
tender with him. Madame Max Goesler, however, intended to be tender
only on one condition.
When Lady Glencora entered the room, Madame Goesler received her
beautifully. "How lucky that you should have come just when his Grace
is here!" she said.
"I saw my uncle's carriage, and of course I knew it," said Lady
Glencora.
"Then the favour is to him," said Madame Goesler, smiling.
"No, indeed; I was coming. If my word is to be doubted in that point,
I must insist on having the servant up; I must, certainly. I told
him to drive to this door, as far back as Grosvenor Street. Did I
not, Planty?" Planty was the little Lord Silverbridge as was to
be, if nothing unfortunate intervened, who was now sitting on his
granduncle's knee.
"Dou said to the little house in Park Lane," said the boy.
"Yes,--because I forgot the number."
"And it is the smallest house in Park Lane, so the evidence is
complete," said Madame Goesler. Lady Glencora had not cared much for
evidence to convince Madame Goesler, but she had not wished her uncle
to think that he was watched and hunted down. It might be necessary
that he should know that he was watched, but things had not come to
that as yet.
"How is Plantagenet?" asked the Duke.
"Answer for papa," said Lady Glencora to her child.
"Papa is very well, but he almost never comes home."
"He is working for his country," said the Duke. "Your papa is a busy,
useful man, and can't afford time to play with a little boy as I
can."
"But papa is not a duke."
"He will be some day, and that probably before long, my boy. He will
be a duke quite as soon as he wants to be a duke. He likes the House
of Commons better than the strawberry leaves, I fancy. There is not a
man in England less in a hurry than he is."
"No, indeed," said Lady Glencora.
"How nice that is," said Madame Goesler.
"And I ain't in a hurry either,--am I, mamma?" said the little future
Lord Silverbridge.
"You are a wicked little monkey," said his grand-uncle, kissing him.
At this moment Lady Glencora was, no doubt, thinking how necessary
it was that she should be careful to see that things did turn out
in the manner proposed,--so that people who had waited should not
be disappointed; and the Duke was perhaps thinking that he was not
absolutely bound to his nephew by any law of God or man; and Madame
Max Goesler,--I wonder whether her thoughts were injurious to the
prospects of that handsome bold-faced little boy.
Lady Glencora rose to take her leave first. It was not for her to
show any anxiety to force the Duke out of the lady's presence. If the
Duke were resolved to make a fool of himself, nothing that she could
do would prevent it. But she thought that this little inspection
might possibly be of service, and that her uncle's ardour would
be cooled by the interruption to which he had been subjected. So
she went, and immediately afterwards the Duke followed her. The
interruption had, at any rate, saved him on that occasion from making
the highest bid for the pleasure of Madame Goesler's company at Como.
The Duke went down with the little boy in his hand, so that there
was not an opportunity for a single word of interest between the
gentleman and the lady.
Madame Goesler, when she was alone, seated herself on her sofa,
tucking her feet up under her as though she were seated somewhere in
the East, pushed her ringlets back roughly from her face, and then
placed her two hands to her sides so that her thumbs rested lightly
on her girdle. When alone with something weighty on her mind she
would sit in this form for the hour together, resolving, or trying
to resolve, what should be her conduct. She did few things without
much thinking, and though she walked very boldly, she walked warily.
She often told herself that such success as she had achieved could
not have been achieved without much caution. And yet she was ever
discontented with herself, telling herself that all that she had done
was nothing, or worse than nothing. What was it all, to have a duke
and to have lords dining with her, to dine with lords or with a duke
itself, if life were dull with her, and the hours hung heavy! Life
with her was dull, and the hours did hang heavy. And what if she
caught this old man, and became herself a duchess,--caught him by
means of his weakness, to the inexpressible dismay of all those
who were bound to him by ties of blood,--would that make her life
happier, or her hours less tedious? That prospect of a life on the
Italian lakes with an old man tied to her side was not so charming in
her eyes as it was in those of the Duke. Were she to succeed, and to
be blazoned forth to the world as Duchess of Omnium, what would she
have gained?
She perfectly understood the motive of Lady Glencora's visit, and
thought that she would at any rate gain something in the very triumph
of baffling the manoeuvres of so clever a woman. Let Lady Glencora
throw her ægis before the Duke, and it would be something to carry
off his Grace from beneath the protection of so thick a shield. The
very flavour of the contest was pleasing to Madame Goesler. But, the
victory gained, what then would remain to her? Money she had already;
position, too, she had of her own. She was free as air, and should it
suit her at any time to go off to some lake of Como in society that
would personally be more agreeable to her than that of the Duke of
Omnium, there was nothing to hinder her for a moment. And then came a
smile over her face,--but the saddest smile,--as she thought of one
with whom it might be pleasant to look at the colour of Italian skies
and feel the softness of Italian breezes. In feigning to like to do
this with an old man, in acting the raptures of love on behalf of a
worn-out duke who at the best would scarce believe in her acting,
there would not be much delight for her. She had never yet known what
it was to have anything of the pleasure of love. She had grown, as
she often told herself, to be a hard, cautious, selfish, successful
woman, without any interference or assistance from such pleasure.
Might there not be yet time left for her to try it without
selfishness,--with an absolute devotion of self,--if only she
could find the right companion? There was one who might be such a
companion, but the Duke of Omnium certainly could not be such a one.
But to be Duchess of Omnium! After all, success in this world is
everything;--is at any rate the only thing the pleasure of which will
endure. There was the name of many a woman written in a black list
within Madame Goesler's breast,--written there because of scorn,
because of rejected overtures, because of deep social injury; and
Madame Goesler told herself often that it would be a pleasure to her
to use the list, and to be revenged on those who had ill-used and
scornfully treated her. She did not readily forgive those who had
injured her. As Duchess of Omnium she thought that probably she might
use that list with efficacy. Lady Glencora had treated her well, and
she had no such feeling against Lady Glencora. As Duchess of Omnium
she would accept Lady Glencora as her dearest friend, if Lady
Glencora would admit it. But if it should be necessary that there
should be a little duel between them, as to which of them should take
the Duke in hand, the duel must of course be fought. In a matter so
important, one woman would of course expect no false sentiment from
another. She and Lady Glencora would understand each other;--and no
doubt, respect each other.
I have said that she would sit there resolving, or trying to resolve.
There is nothing in the world so difficult as that task of making
up one's mind. Who is there that has not longed that the power and
privilege of selection among alternatives should be taken away from
him in some important crisis of his life, and that his conduct should
be arranged for him, either this way or that, by some divine power
if it were possible,--by some patriarchal power in the absence of
divinity,--or by chance even, if nothing better than chance could be
found to do it? But no one dares to cast the die, and to go honestly
by the hazard. There must be the actual necessity of obeying the die,
before even the die can be of any use. As it was, when Madame Goesler
had sat there for an hour, till her legs were tired beneath her, she
had not resolved. It must be as her impulse should direct her when
the important moment came. There was not a soul on earth to whom she
could go for counsel, and when she asked herself for counsel, the
counsel would not come.
Two days afterwards the Duke called again. He would come generally on
a Thursday,--early, so that he might be there before other visitors;
and he had already quite learned that when he was there other
visitors would probably be refused admittance. How Lady Glencora had
made her way in, telling the servant that her uncle was there, he had
not understood. That visit had been made on the Thursday, but now he
came on the Saturday,--having, I regret to say, sent down some early
fruit from his own hot-houses,--or from Covent Garden,--with a little
note on the previous day. The grapes might have been pretty well, but
the note was injudicious. There were three lines about the grapes, as
to which there was some special history, the vine having been brought
from the garden of some villa in which some ill-used queen had lived
and died; and then there was a postscript in one line to say that the
Duke would call on the following morning. I do not think that he had
meant to add this when he began his note; but then children, who want
the top brick, want it so badly, and cry for it so perversely!
Of course Madame Goesler was at home. But even then she had not made
up her mind. She had made up her mind only to this,--that he should
be made to speak plainly, and that she would take time for her reply.
Not even with such a gem as the Duke's coronet before her eyes, would
she jump at it. Where there was so much doubt, there need at least be
no impatience.
"You ran away the other day, Duke, because you could not resist the
charm of that little boy," she said, laughing.
"He is a dear little boy,--but it was not that," he answered.
"Then what was it? Your niece carried you off in a whirl-wind. She
was come and gone, taking you with her, in half a minute."
"She had disturbed me when I was thinking of something," said the
Duke.
"Things shouldn't be thought of,--not so deeply as that." Madame
Goesler was playing with a bunch of his grapes now, eating one or
two from a small china plate which had stood upon the table, and
he thought that he had never seen a woman so graceful and yet
so natural. "Will you not eat your own grapes with me? They are
delicious;--flavoured with the poor queen's sorrows." He shook his
head, knowing that it did not suit his gastric juices to have to deal
with fruit eaten at odd times. "Never think, Duke. I am convinced
that it does no good. It simply means doubting, and doubt always
leads to error. The safest way in the world is to do nothing."
"I believe so," said the Duke.
"Much the safest. But if you have not sufficient command over
yourself to enable you to sit in repose, always quiet, never
committing yourself to the chance of any danger,--then take a leap in
the dark; or rather many leaps. A stumbling horse regains his footing
by persevering in his onward course. As for moving cautiously, that I
detest."
"And yet one must think;--for instance, whether one will succeed or
not."
"Take that for granted always. Remember, I do not recommend motion at
all. Repose is my idea of life;--repose and grapes."
The Duke sat for a while silent, taking his repose as far as the
outer man was concerned, looking at his top brick of the chimney, as
from time to time she ate one of his grapes. Probably she did not eat
above half-a-dozen of them altogether, but he thought that the grapes
must have been made for the woman, she was so pretty in the eating of
them. But it was necessary that he should speak at last. "Have you
been thinking of coming to Como?" he said.
"I told you that I never think."
"But I want an answer to my proposition."
"I thought I had answered your Grace on that question." Then she put
down the grapes, and moved herself on her chair, so that she sat with
her face turned away from him.
"But a request to a lady may be made twice."
"Oh, yes. And I am grateful, knowing how far it is from your
intention to do me any harm. And I am somewhat ashamed of my warmth
on the other day. But still there can be but one answer. There
are delights which a woman must deny herself, let them be ever so
delightful."
"I had thought,--" the Duke began, and then he stopped himself.
"Your Grace was saying that you thought,--"
"Marie, a man at my age does not like to be denied."
"What man likes to be denied anything by a woman at any age? A woman
who denies anything is called cruel at once,--even though it be
her very soul." She had turned round upon him now, and was leaning
forward towards him from her chair, so that he could touch her if he
put out his hand.
He put out his hand and touched her. "Marie," he said, "will you deny
me if I ask?"
"Nay, my lord; how shall I say? There is many a trifle I would deny
you. There is many a great gift I would give you willingly."
"But the greatest gift of all?"
"My lord, if you have anything to say, you must say it plainly. There
never was a woman worse than I am at the reading of riddles."
"Could you endure to live in the quietude of an Italian lake with an
old man?" Now he touched her again, and had taken her hand.
"No, my lord;--nor with a young one,--for all my days. But I do not
know that age would guide me."
Then the Duke rose and made his proposition in form. "Marie, you know
that I love you. Why it is that I at my age should feel so sore a
love, I cannot say."
"So sore a love!"
"So sore, if it be not gratified. Marie, I ask you to be my wife."
"Duke of Omnium, this from you!"
"Yes, from me. My coronet is at your feet. If you will allow me to
raise it, I will place it on your brow."
Then she went away from him, and seated herself at a distance. After
a moment or two he followed her, and stood with his arm upon her
shoulder. "You will give me an answer, Marie?"
"You cannot have thought of this, my lord."
"Nay; I have thought of it much."
"And your friends?"
"My dear, I may venture to please myself in this,--as in everything.
Will you not answer me?"
"Certainly not on the spur of the moment, my lord. Think how high is
the position you offer me, and how immense is the change you propose
to me. Allow me two days, and I will answer you by letter. I am so
fluttered now that I must leave you." Then he came to her, took her
hand, kissed her brow, and opened the door for her.
CHAPTER LXI
Another Duel
It happened that there were at this time certain matters of business
to be settled between the Duke of Omnium and his nephew Mr. Palliser,
respecting which the latter called upon his uncle on the morning
after the Duke had committed himself by his offer. Mr. Palliser had
come by appointment made with Mr. Fothergill, the Duke's man of
business, and had expected to meet Mr. Fothergill. Mr. Fothergill,
however, was not with the Duke, and the uncle told the nephew that
the business had been postponed. Then Mr. Palliser asked some
question as to the reason of such postponement, not meaning much by
his question,--and the Duke, after a moment's hesitation, answered
him, meaning very much by his answer. "The truth is, Plantagenet,
that it is possible that I may marry, and if so this arrangement
would not suit me."
"Are you going to be married?" asked the astonished nephew.
"It is not exactly that,--but it is possible that I may do so. Since
I proposed this matter to Fothergill, I have been thinking over it,
and I have changed my mind. It will make but little difference to
you; and after all you are a far richer man than I am."
"I am not thinking of money, Duke," said Plantagenet Palliser.
"Of what then were you thinking?"
"Simply of what you told me. I do not in the least mean to
interfere."
"I hope not, Plantagenet."
"But I could not hear such a statement from you without some
surprise. Whatever you do I hope will tend to make you happy."
So much passed between the uncle and the nephew, and what the uncle
told to the nephew, the nephew of course told to his wife. "He was
with her again, yesterday," said Lady Glencora, "for more than an
hour. And he had been half the morning dressing himself before he
went to her."
"He is not engaged to her, or he would have told me," said
Plantagenet Palliser.
"I think he would, but there is no knowing. At the present moment I
have only one doubt,--whether to act upon him or upon her."
"I do not see that you can do good by going to either."
"Well, we will see. If she be the woman I take her to be, I think I
could do something with her. I have never supposed her to be a bad
woman,--never. I will think of it." Then Lady Glencora left her
husband, and did not consult him afterwards as to the course she
would pursue. He had his budget to manage, and his speeches to make.
The little affair of the Duke and Madame Goesler, she thought it best
to take into her own hands without any assistance from him. "What a
fool I was," she said to herself, "to have her down there when the
Duke was at Matching!"
Madame Goesler, when she was left alone, felt that now indeed she
must make up her mind. She had asked for two days. The intervening
day was a Sunday, and on the Monday she must send her answer. She
might doubt at any rate for this one night,--the Saturday night,--and
sit playing, as it were, with the coronet of a duchess in her lap.
She had been born the daughter of a small country attorney, and now a
duke had asked her to be his wife,--and a duke who was acknowledged
to stand above other dukes! Nothing at any rate could rob her of that
satisfaction. Whatever resolution she might form at last, she had by
her own resources reached a point of success in remembering which
there would always be a keen gratification. It would be much to be
Duchess of Omnium; but it would be something also to have refused to
be a Duchess of Omnium. During that evening, that night, and the next
morning, she remained playing with the coronet in her lap. She would
not go to church. What good could any sermon do her while that bauble
was dangling before her eyes? After church-time, about two o'clock,
Phineas Finn came to her. Just at this period Phineas would come
to her often;--sometimes full of a new decision to forget Violet
Effingham altogether, at others minded to continue his siege let the
hope of success be ever so small. He had now heard that Violet and
Lord Chiltern had in truth quarrelled, and was of course anxious to
be advised to continue the siege. When he first came in and spoke a
word or two, in which there was no reference to Violet Effingham,
there came upon Madame Goesler a strong wish to decide at once that
she would play no longer with the coronet, that the gem was not worth
the cost she would be called upon to pay for it. There was something
in the world better for her than the coronet,--if only it might be
had. But within ten minutes he had told her the whole tale about Lord
Chiltern, and how he had seen Violet at Lady Baldock's,--and how
there might yet be hope for him. What would she advise him to do? "Go
home, Mr. Finn," she said, "and write a sonnet to her eyebrow. See if
that will have any effect."
"Ah, well! It is natural that you should laugh at me; but somehow, I
did not expect it from you."
"Do not be angry with me. What I mean is that such little things seem
to influence this Violet of yours."
"Do they? I have not found that they do so."
"If she had loved Lord Chiltern she would not have quarrelled with
him for a few words. If she had loved you, she would not have
accepted Lord Chiltern. If she loves neither of you, she should say
so. I am losing my respect for her."
"Do not say that, Madame Goesler. I respect her as strongly as I love
her." Then Madame Goesler almost made up her mind that she would have
the coronet. There was a substance about the coronet that would not
elude her grasp.
Late that afternoon, while she was still hesitating, there came
another caller to the cottage in Park Lane. She was still hesitating,
feeling that she had as yet another night before her. Should she be
Duchess of Omnium or not? All that she wished to be, she could not
be;--but to be Duchess of Omnium was within her reach. Then she began
to ask herself various questions. Would the Queen refuse to accept
her in her new rank? Refuse! How could any Queen refuse to accept
her? She had not done aught amiss in life. There was no slur on her
name; no stain on her character. What though her father had been a
small attorney, and her first husband a Jew banker! She had broken
no law of God or man, had been accused of breaking no law, which
breaking or which accusation need stand in the way of her being as
good a duchess as any other woman! She was sitting thinking of this,
almost angry with herself at the awe with which the proposed rank
inspired her, when Lady Glencora was announced to her.
"Madame Goesler," said Lady Glencora, "I am very glad to find you."
"And I more than equally so, to be found," said Madame Goesler,
smiling with all her grace.
"My uncle has been with you since I saw you last?"
"Oh yes;--more than once if I remember right. He was here yesterday
at any rate."
"He comes often to you then?"
"Not so often as I would wish, Lady Glencora. The Duke is one of my
dearest friends."
"It has been a quick friendship."
"Yes;--a quick friendship," said Madame Goesler. Then there was a
pause for some moments which Madame Goesler was determined that she
would not break. It was clear to her now on what ground Lady Glencora
had come to her, and she was fully minded that if she could bear the
full light of the god himself in all his glory, she would not allow
herself to be scorched by any reflected heat coming from the god's
niece. She thought she could endure anything that Lady Glencora might
say; but she would wait and hear what might be said.
"I think, Madame Goesler, that I had better hurry on to my subject
at once," said Lady Glencora, almost hesitating as she spoke, and
feeling that the colour was rushing up to her cheeks and covering her
brow. "Of course what I have to say will be disagreeable. Of course I
shall offend you. And yet I do not mean it."
"I shall be offended at nothing, Lady Glencora, unless I think that
you mean to offend me."
"I protest that I do not. You have seen my little boy."
"Yes, indeed. The sweetest child! God never gave me anything half so
precious as that."
"He is the Duke's heir."
"So I understand."
"For myself, by my honour as a woman, I care nothing. I am rich and
have all that the world can give me. For my husband, in this matter,
I care nothing. His career he will make for himself, and it will
depend on no title."
"Why all this to me, Lady Glencora? What have I to do with your
husband's titles?"
"Much;--if it be true that there is an idea of marriage between you
and the Duke of Omnium."
"Psha!" said Madame Goesler, with all the scorn of which she was
mistress.
"It is untrue, then?" asked Lady Glencora.
"No;--it is not untrue. There is an idea of such a marriage."
"And you are engaged to him?"
"No;--I am not engaged to him."
"Has he asked you?"
"Lady Glencora, I really must say that such a cross-questioning
from one lady to another is very unusual. I have promised not to be
offended, unless I thought that you wished to offend me. But do not
drive me too far."
"Madame Goesler, if you will tell me that I am mistaken, I will beg
your pardon, and offer to you the most sincere friendship which one
woman can give another."
"Lady Glencora, I can tell you nothing of the kind."
"Then it is to be so! And have you thought what you would gain?"
"I have thought much of what I should gain:--and something also of
what I should lose."
"You have money."
"Yes, indeed; plenty,--for wants so moderate as mine."
"And position."
"Well, yes; a sort of position. Not such as yours, Lady Glencora.
That, if it be not born to a woman, can only come to her from a
husband. She cannot win it for herself."
"You are free as air, going where you like, and doing what you like."
"Too free, sometimes," said Madame Goesler.
"And what will you gain by changing all this simply for a title?"
"But for such a title, Lady Glencora! It may be little to you to be
Duchess of Omnium, but think what it must be to me!"
"And for this you will not hesitate to rob him of all his friends, to
embitter his future life, to degrade him among his peers,--"
"Degrade him! Who dares say that I shall degrade him? He will exalt
me, but I shall no whit degrade him. You forget yourself, Lady
Glencora."
"Ask any one. It is not that I despise you. If I did, would I offer
you my hand in friendship? But an old man, over seventy, carrying the
weight and burden of such rank as his, will degrade himself in the
eyes of his fellows, if he marries a young woman without rank, let
her be ever so clever, ever so beautiful. A Duke of Omnium may not do
as he pleases, as may another man."
"It may be well, Lady Glencora, for other dukes, and for the
daughters and heirs and cousins of other dukes, that his Grace should
try that question. I will, if you wish it, argue this matter with you
on many points, but I will not allow you to say that I should degrade
any man whom I might marry. My name is as unstained as your own."
"I meant nothing of that," said Lady Glencora.
"For him;--I certainly would not willingly injure him. Who wishes
to injure a friend? And, in truth, I have so little to gain, that
the temptation to do him an injury, if I thought it one, is not
strong. For your little boy, Lady Glencora, I think your fears are
premature." As she said this, there came a smile over her face, which
threatened to break from control and almost become laughter. "But, if
you will allow me to say so, my mind will not be turned against this
marriage half so strongly by any arguments you can use as by those
which I can adduce myself. You have nearly driven me into it by
telling me I should degrade his house. It is almost incumbent on me
to prove that you are wrong. But you had better leave me to settle
the matter in my own bosom. You had indeed."
After a while Lady Glencora did leave her,--to settle the matter
within her own bosom,--having no other alternative.
CHAPTER LXII
The Letter That Was Sent to Brighton
Monday morning came and Madame Goesler had as yet written no answer
to the Duke of Omnium. Had not Lady Glencora gone to Park Lane on
the Sunday afternoon, I think the letter would have been written on
that day; but, whatever may have been the effect of Lady Glencora's
visit, it so far disturbed Madame Goesler as to keep her from her
writing-table. There was yet another night for thought, and then the
letter should be written on the Monday morning.
When Lady Glencora left Madame Goesler she went at once to the Duke's
house. It was her custom to see her husband's uncle on a Sunday, and
she would most frequently find him just at this hour,--before he went
up-stairs to dress for dinner. She usually took her boy with her, but
on this occasion she went alone. She had tried what she could do with
Madame Goesler, and she found that she had failed. She must now make
her attempt upon the Duke. But the Duke, perhaps anticipating some
attack of the kind, had fled. "Where is his Grace, Barker?" said Lady
Glencora to the porter. "We do not know, your ladyship. His Grace
went away yesterday evening with nobody but Lapoule." Lapoule was
the Duke's French valet. Lady Glencora could only return home and
consider in her own mind what batteries might yet be brought to
bear upon the Duke, towards stopping the marriage, even after the
engagement should have been made,--if it were to be made. Lady
Glencora felt that such batteries might still be brought up as would
not improbably have an effect on a proud, weak old man. If all other
resources failed, royalty in some of its branches might be induced
to make a request, and every august relation in the peerage should
interfere. The Duke no doubt might persevere and marry whom he
pleased,--if he were strong enough. But it requires much personal
strength,--that standing alone against the well-armed batteries of
all one's friends. Lady Glencora had once tried such a battle on
her own behalf, and had failed. She had wished to be imprudent when
she was young; but her friends had been too strong for her. She had
been reduced, and kept in order, and made to run in a groove,--and
was now, when she sat looking at her little boy with his bold face,
almost inclined to think that the world was right, and that grooves
were best. But if she had been controlled when she was young, so
ought the Duke to be controlled now that he was old. It is all very
well for a man or woman to boast that he,--or she,--may do what he
likes with his own,--or with her own. But there are circumstances in
which such self-action is ruinous to so many that coercion from the
outside becomes absolutely needed. Nobody had felt the injustice of
such coercion when applied to herself more sharply than had Lady
Glencora. But she had lived to acknowledge that such coercion might
be proper, and was now prepared to use it in any shape in which it
might be made available. It was all very well for Madame Goesler
to laugh and exclaim, "Psha!" when Lady Glencora declared her real
trouble. But should it ever come to pass that a black-browed baby
with a yellow skin should be shown to the world as Lord Silverbridge,
Lady Glencora knew that her peace of mind would be gone for ever. She
had begun the world desiring one thing, and had missed it. She had
suffered much, and had then reconciled herself to other hopes. If
those other hopes were also to be cut away from her, the world would
not be worth a pinch of snuff to her. The Duke had fled, and she
could do nothing to-day; but to-morrow she would begin with her
batteries. And she herself had done the mischief! She had invited
this woman down to Matching! Heaven and earth!--that such a man as
the Duke should be such a fool!--The widow of a Jew banker! He, the
Duke of Omnium,--and thus to cut away from himself, for the rest of
his life, all honour, all peace of mind, all the grace of a noble
end to a career which, if not very noble in itself, had received
the praise of nobility! And to do this for a thin, black-browed,
yellow-visaged woman with ringlets and devil's eyes, and a beard on
her upper lip,--a Jewess,--a creature of whose habits of life and
manners of thought they all were absolutely ignorant; who drank,
possibly; who might have been a forger, for what any one knew;
an adventuress who had found her way into society by her art and
perseverance,--and who did not even pretend to have a relation in
the world! That such a one should have influence enough to intrude
herself into the house of Omnium, and blot the scutcheon, and,--
what was worst of all,--perhaps be the mother of future dukes! Lady
Glencora, in her anger, was very unjust to Madame Goesler, thinking
all evil of her, accusing her in her mind of every crime, denying
her all charm, all beauty. Had the Duke forgotten himself and his
position for the sake of some fair girl with a pink complexion and
grey eyes, and smooth hair, and a father, Lady Glencora thought that
she would have forgiven it better. It might be that Madame Goesler
would win her way to the coronet; but when she came to put it on, she
should find that there were sharp thorns inside the lining of it. Not
a woman worth the knowing in all London should speak to her;--nor a
man either of those men with whom a Duchess of Omnium would wish to
hold converse. She should find her husband rated as a doting fool,
and herself rated as a scheming female adventuress. And it should go
hard with Lady Glencora, if the Duke were not separated from his new
Duchess before the end of the first year! In her anger Lady Glencora
was very unjust.
The Duke, when he left his house without telling his household
whither he was going, did send his address to,--the top brick of the
chimney. His note, which was delivered at Madame Goesler's house late
on the Sunday evening, was as follows:--"I am to have your answer on
Monday. I shall be at Brighton. Send it by a private messenger to the
Bedford Hotel there. I need not tell you with what expectation, with
what hope, with what fear I shall await it.--O." Poor old man! He had
run through all the pleasures of life too quickly, and had not much
left with which to amuse himself. At length he had set his eyes on a
top brick, and being tired of everything else, wanted it very sorely.
Poor old man! How should it do him any good, even if he got it?
Madame Goesler, when she received the note, sat with it in her
hand, thinking of his great want. "And he would be tired of his new
plaything after a month," she said to herself. But she had given
herself to the next morning, and she would not make up her mind that
night. She would sleep once more with the coronet of a duchess within
her reach. She did do so; and woke in the morning with her mind
absolutely in doubt. When she walked down to breakfast, all doubt was
at an end. The time had come when it was necessary that she should
resolve, and while her maid was brushing her hair for her she did
make her resolution.
"What a thing it is to be a great lady," said the maid, who may
probably have reflected that the Duke of Omnium did not come here so
often for nothing.
"What do you mean by that, Lotta?"
"The women I know, madame, talk so much of their countesses, and
ladyships, and duchesses. I would never rest till I had a title in
this country, if I were a lady,--and rich and beautiful."
"And can the countesses, and the ladyships, and the duchesses do as
they please?"
"Ah, madame;--I know not that."
"But I know. That will do, Lotta. Now leave me." Then Madame Goesler
had made up her mind; but I do not know whether that doubt as to
having her own way had much to do with it. As the wife of an old man
she would probably have had much of her own way. Immediately after
breakfast she wrote her answer to the Duke, which was as follows:--
Park Lane, Monday.
MY DEAR DUKE OF OMNIUM,
I find so great a difficulty in expressing myself to your
Grace in a written letter, that since you left me I have
never ceased to wish that I had been less nervous, less
doubting, and less foolish when you were present with me
here in my room. I might then have said in one word what
will take so many awkward words to explain.
Great as is the honour you propose to confer on me, rich
as is the gift you offer me, I cannot accept it. I cannot
be your Grace's wife. I may almost say that I knew it
was so when you parted from me; but the surprise of the
situation took away from me a part of my judgment, and
made me unable to answer you as I should have done. My
lord, the truth is, that I am not fit to be the wife of
the Duke of Omnium. I should injure you; and though I
should raise myself in name, I should injure myself in
character. But you must not think, because I say this,
that there is any reason why I should not be an honest
man's wife. There is none. I have nothing on my conscience
which I could not tell you,--or to another man; nothing
that I need fear to tell to all the world. Indeed, my
lord, there is nothing to tell but this,--that I am not
fitted by birth and position to be the wife of the Duke of
Omnium. You would have to blush for me, and that no man
shall ever have to do on my account.
I will own that I have been ambitious, too ambitious, and
have been pleased to think that one so exalted as you are,
one whose high position is so rife in the eyes of all men,
should have taken pleasure in my company. I will confess
to a foolish woman's silly vanity in having wished to be
known to be the friend of the Duke of Omnium. I am like
the other moths that flutter near the light and have their
wings burned. But I am wiser than they in this, that
having been scorched, I know that I must keep my distance.
You will easily believe that a woman, such as I am, does
not refuse to ride in a carriage with your Grace's arms on
the panels without a regret. I am no philosopher. I do not
pretend to despise the rich things of the world, or the
high things. According to my way of thinking a woman ought
to wish to be Duchess of Omnium;--but she ought to wish
also to be able to carry her coronet with a proper grace.
As Madame Goesler I can live, even among my superiors, at
my ease. As your Grace's wife, I should be easy no longer;
--nor would your Grace.
You will think perhaps that what I write is heartless,
that I speak altogether of your rank, and not at all of
the affection you have shown me, or of that which I might
possibly bear towards you. I think that when the first
flush of passion is over in early youth men and women
should strive to regulate their love, as they do their
other desires, by their reason. I could love your Grace,
fondly, as your wife, if I thought it well for your Grace
or for myself that we should be man and wife. As I think
it would be ill for both of us, I will restrain that
feeling, and remember your Grace ever with the purest
feeling of true friendship.
Before I close this letter, I must utter a word of
gratitude. In the kind of life which I have led as a
widow, a life which has been very isolated as regards
true fellowship, it has been my greatest effort to obtain
the good opinion of those among whom I have attempted to
make my way. I may, perhaps, own to you now that I have
had many difficulties. A woman who is alone in the world
is ever regarded with suspicion. In this country a woman
with a foreign name, with means derived from foreign
sources, with a foreign history, is specially suspected.
I have striven to live that down, and I have succeeded.
But in my wildest dreams I never dreamed of such success
as this,--that the Duke of Omnium should think me the
worthiest of the worthy. You may be sure that I am not
ungrateful,--that I never will be ungrateful. And I trust
it will not derogate from your opinion of my worth, that
I have known what was due to your Grace's highness.
I have the honour to be,
My Lord Duke,
Your most obliged and faithful servant,
MARIE MAX GOESLER.
"How many unmarried women in England are there would do the same?"
she said to herself, as she folded the paper, and put it into an
envelope, and sealed the cover. The moment that the letter was
completed she sent it off, as she was directed to send it, so
that there might be no possibility of repentance and subsequent
hesitation. She had at last made up her mind, and she would stand
by the making. She knew that there would come moments in which she
would deeply regret the opportunity that she had lost,--the chance
of greatness that she had flung away from her. But so would she
have often regretted it, also, had she accepted the greatness. Her
position was one in which there must be regret, let her decision have
been what it might. But she had decided, and the thing was done. She
would still be free,--Marie Max Goesler,--unless in abandoning her
freedom she would obtain something that she might in truth prefer to
it. When the letter was gone she sat disconsolate, at the window of
an up-stairs room in which she had written, thinking much of the
coronet, much of the name, much of the rank, much of that position
in society which she had flattered herself she might have won for
herself as Duchess of Omnium by her beauty, her grace, and her wit.
It had not been simply her ambition to be a duchess, without further
aim or object. She had fancied that she might have been such a
duchess as there is never another, so that her fame might have been
great throughout Europe, as a woman charming at all points. And she
would have had friends, then,--real friends, and would not have lived
alone as it was now her fate to do. And she would have loved her
ducal husband, old though he was, and stiff with pomp and ceremony.
She would have loved him, and done her best to add something of
brightness to his life. It was indeed true that there was one whom
she loved better; but of what avail was it to love a man who, when he
came to her, would speak to her of nothing but of the charms which he
found in another woman!
She had been sitting thus at her window, with a book in her hand, at
which she never looked, gazing over the park which was now beautiful
with its May verdure, when on a sudden a thought struck her. Lady
Glencora Palliser had come to her, trying to enlist her sympathy for
the little heir, behaving, indeed, not very well, as Madame Goesler
had thought, but still with an earnest purpose which was in itself
good. She would write to Lady Glencora and put her out of her misery.
Perhaps there was some feeling of triumph in her mind as she returned
to the desk from which her epistle had been sent to the Duke;--not of
that triumph which would have found its gratification in boasting of
the offer that had been made to her, but arising from a feeling that
she could now show the proud mother of the bold-faced boy that though
she would not pledge herself to any woman as to what she might do or
not do, she was nevertheless capable of resisting such a temptation
as would have been irresistible to many. Of the Duke's offer to her
she would have spoken to no human being, had not this woman shown
that the Duke's purpose was known at least to her, and now, in her
letter, she would write no plain word of that offer. She would not
state, in words intelligible to any one who might read, that the Duke
had offered her his hand and his coronet. But she would write so that
Lady Glencora should understand her. And she would be careful that
there should be no word in the letter to make Lady Glencora think
that she supposed herself to be unfit for the rank offered to her.
She had been very humble in what she had written to the Duke, but
she would not be at all humble in what she was about to write to the
mother of the bold-faced boy. And this was the letter when it was
written:--
MY DEAR LADY GLENCORA,
I venture to send you a line to put you out of your
misery;--for you were very miserable when you were so good
as to come here yesterday. Your dear little boy is safe
from me;--and, what is more to the purpose, so are you and
your husband,--and your uncle, whom, in truth, I love. You
asked me a downright question which I did not then choose
to answer by a downright answer. The downright answer was
not at that time due to you. It has since been given, and
as I like you too well to wish you to be in torment, I
send you a line to say that I shall never be in the way of
you or your boy.
And now, dear Lady Glencora, one word more. Should it
ever again appear to you to be necessary to use your zeal
for the protection of your husband or your child, do not
endeavour to dissuade a woman by trying to make her think
that she, by her alliance, would bring degradation into
any house, or to any man. If there could have been an
argument powerful with me, to make me do that which you
wished to prevent, it was the argument which you used. But
my own comfort, and the happiness of another person whom
I value almost as much as myself, were too important to
be sacrificed even to a woman's revenge. I take mine by
writing to you and telling you that I am better and more
rational and wiser than you took me to be.
If, after this, you choose to be on good terms with me, I
shall be happy to be your friend. I shall want no further
revenge. You owe me some little apology; but whether you
make it or not, I will be contented, and will never do
more than ask whether your darling's prospects are still
safe. There are more women than one in the world, you
know, and you must not consider yourself to be out of the
wood because you have escaped from a single danger. If
there arise another, come to me, and we will consult
together.
Dear Lady Glencora, yours always sincerely,
MARIE M. G.
There was a thing or two besides which she longed to say, laughing
as she thought of them. But she refrained, and her letter, when
finished, was as it is given above.
On the day following, Lady Glencora was again in Park Lane. When she
first read Madame Goesler's letter, she felt herself to be annoyed
and angry, but her anger was with herself rather than with her
correspondent. Ever since her last interview with the woman whom she
had feared, she had been conscious of having been indiscreet. All her
feelings had been too violent, and it might well have been that she
should have driven this woman to do the very thing that she was so
anxious to avoid. "You owe me some little apology," Madame Goesler
had said. It was true,--and she would apologise. Undue pride was not
a part of Lady Glencora's character. Indeed, there was not enough
of pride in her composition. She had been quite ready to hate this
woman, and to fight her on every point as long as the danger existed;
but she was equally willing to take the woman to her heart now that
the danger was over. Apologise! Of course she would apologise. And
she would make a friend of the woman if the woman wished it. But she
would not have the woman and the Duke at Matching together again,
lest, after all, there might be a mistake. She did not show Madame
Goesler's letter to her husband, or tell him anything of the relief
she had received. He had cared but little for the danger, thinking
more of his budget than of the danger; and would be sufficiently at
his ease if he heard no more rumours of his uncle's marriage. Lady
Glencora went to Park Lane early on the Tuesday morning, but she did
not take her boy with her. She understood that Madame Goesler might
perhaps indulge in a little gentle raillery at the child's expense,
and the mother felt that this might be borne the more easily if the
child were not present.
"I have come to thank you for your letter, Madame Goesler," said Lady
Glencora, before she sat down.
"Oh, come ye in peace here, or come ye in war, or to dance at our
bridal?" said Madame Goesler, standing up from her chair and
laughing, as she sang the lines.
"Certainly not to dance at your bridal," said Lady Glencora.
"Alas! no. You have forbidden the banns too effectually for that, and
I sit here wearing the willow all alone. Why shouldn't I be allowed
to get married as well as another woman, I wonder? I think you have
been very hard upon me among you. But sit down, Lady Glencora. At any
rate you come in peace."
"Certainly in peace, and with much admiration,--and a great deal of
love and affection, and all that kind of thing, if you will only
accept it."
"I shall be too proud, Lady Glencora;--for the Duke's sake, if for no
other reason."
"And I have to make my apology."
"It was made as soon as your carriage stopped at my door with
friendly wheels. Of course I understand. I can know how terrible it
all was to you,--even though the dear little Plantagenet might not
have been in much danger. Fancy what it would be to disturb the
career of a Plantagenet! I am far too well read in history, I can
assure you."
"I said a word for which I am sorry, and which I should not have
said."
"Never mind the word. After all, it was a true word. I do not
hesitate to say so now myself, though I will allow no other woman
to say it,--and no man either. I should have degraded him,--and
disgraced him." Madame Goesler now had dropped the bantering tone
which she had assumed, and was speaking in sober earnest. "I, for
myself, have nothing about me of which I am ashamed. I have no
history to hide, no story to be brought to light to my discredit.
But I have not been so born, or so placed by circumstances, as make
me fit to be the wife of the Duke of Omnium. I should not have been
happy, you know."
"You want nothing, dear Madame Goesler. You have all that society can
give you."
"I do not know about that. I have much given to me by society, but
there are many things that I want;--a bright-faced little boy, for
instance, to go about with me in my carriage. Why did you not bring
him, Lady Glencora?"
"I came out in my penitential sheet, and when one goes in that guise,
one goes alone. I had half a mind to walk."
"You will bring him soon?"
"Oh, yes. He was very anxious to know the other day who was the
beautiful lady with the black hair."
"You did not tell him that the beautiful lady with the black hair was
a possible aunt, was a possible--? But we will not think any more of
things so horrible."
"I told him nothing of my fears, you may be sure."
"Some day, when I am a very old woman, and when his father is quite
an old duke, and when he has a dozen little boys and girls of his
own, you will tell him the story. Then he will reflect what a madman
his great-uncle must have been, to have thought of making a duchess
out of such a wizened old woman as that."
They parted the best of friends, but Lady Glencora was still of
opinion that if the lady and the Duke were to be brought together at
Matching, or elsewhere, there might still be danger.
CHAPTER LXIII
Showing How the Duke Stood His Ground
Mr. Low the barrister, who had given so many lectures to our friend
Phineas Finn, lectures that ought to have been useful, was now
himself in the House of Commons, having reached it in the legitimate
course of his profession. At a certain point of his career, supposing
his career to have been sufficiently prosperous, it becomes natural
to a barrister to stand for some constituency, and natural for him
also to form his politics at that period of his life with a view to
his further advancement, looking, as he does so, carefully at the age
and standing of the various candidates for high legal office. When a
man has worked as Mr. Low had worked, he begins to regard the bench
wistfully, and to calculate the profits of a two years' run in the
Attorney-Generalship. It is the way of the profession, and thus a
proper and sufficient number of real barristers finds its way into
the House. Mr. Low had been angry with Phineas because he, being a
barrister, had climbed into it after another fashion, having taken
up politics, not in the proper way as an assistance to his great
profession, but as a profession in itself. Mr. Low had been quite
sure that his pupil had been wrong in this, and that the error would
at last show itself, to his pupil's cost. And Mrs. Low had been more
sure than Mr. Low, having not unnaturally been jealous that a young
whipper-snapper of a pupil,--as she had once called Phineas,--should
become a Parliament man before her husband, who had worked his way
up gallantly, in the usual course. She would not give way a jot even
now,--not even when she heard that Phineas was going to marry this
and that heiress. For at this period of his life such rumours were
afloat about him, originating probably in his hopes as to Violet
Effingham and his intimacy with Madame Goesler. "Oh, heiresses!"
said Mrs. Low. "I don't believe in heiresses' money till I see it.
Three or four hundred a year is a great fortune for a woman, but it
don't go far in keeping a house in London. And when a woman has got
a little money she generally knows how to spend it. He has begun at
the wrong end, and they who do that never get themselves right at
the last."
At this time Phineas had become somewhat of a fine gentleman, which
made Mrs. Low the more angry with him. He showed himself willing
enough to go to Mrs. Low's house, but when there he seemed to her
to give himself airs. I think that she was unjust to him, and that
it was natural that he should not bear himself beneath her remarks
exactly as he had done when he was nobody. He had certainly been very
successful. He was always listened to in the House, and rarely spoke
except on subjects which belonged to him, or had been allotted to him
as part of his business. He lived quite at his ease with people of
the highest rank,--and those of his own mode of life who disliked him
did so simply because they regarded with envy his too rapid rise. He
rode upon a pretty horse in the park, and was careful in his dress,
and had about him an air of comfortable wealth which Mrs. Low thought
he had not earned. When her husband told her of his sufficient
salary, she would shake her head and express her opinion that a good
time was coming. By which she perhaps meant to imply a belief that
a time was coming in which her husband would have a salary much
better than that now enjoyed by Phineas, and much more likely to be
permanent. The Radicals were not to have office for ever, and when
they were gone, what then? "I don't suppose he saves a shilling,"
said Mrs. Low. "How can he, keeping a horse in the park, and hunting
down in the country, and living with lords? I shouldn't wonder if he
isn't found to be over head and ears in debt when things come to be
looked into." Mrs. Low was fond of an assured prosperity, of money in
the funds, and was proud to think that her husband lived in a house
of his own. "£19 10s. ground-rent to the Portman estate is what we
pay, Mr. Bunce," she once said to that gallant Radical, "and that
comes of beginning at the right end. Mr. Low had nothing when he
began the world, and I had just what made us decent the day we
married. But he began at the right end, and let things go as they may
he can't get a fall." Mr. Bunce and Mrs. Low, though they differed
much in politics, sympathised in reference to Phineas.
"I never believes, ma'am, in nobody doing any good by getting a
place," said Mr. Bunce. "Of course I don't mean judges and them like,
which must be. But when a young man has ever so much a year for
sitting in a big room down at Whitehall, and reading a newspaper
with his feet up on a chair, I don't think it honest, whether he's
a Parliament man or whether he ain't." Whence Mr. Bunce had got his
notions as to the way in which officials at Whitehall pass their
time, I cannot say; but his notions are very common notions. The
British world at large is slow to believe that the great British
housekeeper keeps no more cats than what kill mice.
Mr. Low, who was now frequently in the habit of seeing Phineas at
the House, had somewhat changed his opinions, and was not so eager
in condemning Phineas as was his wife. He had begun to think that
perhaps Phineas had shown some knowledge of his own aptitudes in the
career which he had sought, and was aware, at any rate, that his late
pupil was somebody in the House of Commons. A man will almost always
respect him whom those around him respect, and will generally look up
to one who is evidently above himself in his own daily avocation. Now
Phineas was certainly above Mr. Low in parliamentary reputation. He
sat on a front bench. He knew the leaders of parties. He was at home
amidst the forms of the House. He enjoyed something of the prestige
of Government power. And he walked about familiarly with the sons of
dukes and the brothers of earls in a manner which had its effect even
on Mr. Low. Seeing these things Mr. Low could not maintain his old
opinion as stoutly as did his wife. It was almost a privilege to Mr.
Low to be intimate with Phineas Finn. How then could he look down
upon him?
He was surprised, therefore, one day when Phineas discussed the
matter with him fully. Phineas had asked him what would be his chance
of success if even now he were to give up politics and take to the
Bar as the means of earning his livelihood. "You would have uphill
work at first, as a matter of course," said Mr. Low.
"But it might be done, I suppose. To have been in office would not be
fatal to me?"
"No, not fatal, Nothing of the kind need be fatal. Men have
succeeded, and have sat on the bench afterwards, who did not begin
till they were past forty. You would have to live down a prejudice
created against yourself; that is all. The attorneys do not like
barristers who are anything else but barristers."
"The attorneys are very arbitrary, I know," said Phineas.
"Yes;--and there would be this against you--that it is so difficult
for a man to go back to the verdure and malleability of pupildom,
who has once escaped from the necessary humility of its conditions.
You will find it difficult to sit and wait for business in a
Vice-Chancellor's Court, after having had Vice-Chancellors, or men
as big as Vice-Chancellors, to wait upon you."
"I do not think much of that."
"But others would think of it, and you would find that there were
difficulties. But you are not thinking of it in earnest?"
"Yes, in earnest."
"Why so? I should have thought that every day had removed you
further and further from any such idea."
"The ground I'm on at present is so slippery."
"Well, yes. I can understand that. But yet it is less slippery than
it used to be."
"Ah;--you do not exactly see. What if I were to lose my seat?"
"You are safe at least for the next four years, I should say."
"Ah;--no one can tell. And suppose I took it into my head to differ
from the Government?"
"You must not do that. You have put yourself into a boat with these
men, and you must remain in the boat. I should have thought all that
was easy to you."
"It is not so easy as it seems. The very necessity of sitting still
in the boat is in itself irksome,--very irksome. And then there comes
some crisis in which a man cannot sit still."
"Is there any such crisis at hand now?"
"I cannot say that;--but I am beginning to find that sitting still is
very disagreeable to me. When I hear those fellows below having their
own way, and saying just what they like, it makes me furious. There
is Robson. He tried office for a couple of years, and has broken
away; and now, by George, there is no man they think so much of as
they do of Robson. He is twice the man he was when he sat on the
Treasury Bench."
"He is a man of fortune;--is he not?"
"I suppose so. Of course he is, because he lives. He never earns
anything. His wife had money."
"My dear Finn, that makes all the difference. When a man has means
of his own he can please himself. Do you marry a wife with money,
and then you may kick up your heels, and do as you like about the
Colonial Office. When a man hasn't money, of course he must fit
himself to the circumstances of a profession."
"Though his profession may require him to be dishonest."
"I did not say that."
"But I say it, my dear Low. A man who is ready to vote black white
because somebody tells him, is dishonest. Never mind, old fellow. I
shall pull through, I daresay. Don't go and tell your wife all this,
or she'll be harder upon me than ever when she sees me." After that
Mr. Low began to think that his wife's judgment in this matter had
been better than his own.
Robson could do as he liked because he had married a woman with
money. Phineas told himself that that game was also open to him. He,
too, might marry money. Violet Effingham had money;--quite enough to
make him independent were he married to her. And Madame Goesler had
money;--plenty of money. And an idea had begun to creep upon him that
Madame Goesler would take him were he to offer himself. But he would
sooner go back to the Bar as the lowest pupil, sooner clean boots for
barristers,--so he told himself,--than marry a woman simply because
she had money, than marry any other woman as long as there was a
chance that Violet might be won. But it was very desirable that he
should know whether Violet might be won or not. It was now July, and
everybody would be gone in another month. Before August would be over
he was to start for Ireland with Mr. Monk, and he knew that words
would be spoken in Ireland which might make it indispensable for
him to be, at any rate, able to throw up his office. In these days
he became more anxious than he used to be about Miss Effingham's
fortune.
He had never spoken as yet to Lord Brentford since the day on which
the Earl had quarrelled with him, nor had he ever been at the house
in Portman Square. Lady Laura he met occasionally, and had always
spoken to her. She was gracious to him, but there had been no renewal
of their intimacy. Rumours had reached him that things were going
badly with her and her husband; but when men repeated such rumours
in his presence, he said little or nothing on the subject. It was
not for him, at any rate, to speak of Lady Laura's unhappiness. Lord
Chiltern he had seen once or twice during the last month, and they
had met cordially as friends. Of course he could ask no question
from Lord Chiltern as to Violet; but he did learn that his friend
had again patched up some reconciliation with his father. "He has
quarrelled with me, you know," said Phineas.
"I am very sorry, but what could I do? As things went, I was obliged
to tell him."
"Do not suppose for a moment that I am blaming you. It is, no doubt,
much better that he should know it all."
"And it cannot make much difference to you, I should say."
"One doesn't like to quarrel with those who have been kind to one,"
said Phineas.
"But it isn't your doing. He'll come right again after a time. When
I can get my own affairs settled, you may be sure I'll do my best to
bring him round. But what's the reason you never see Laura now?"
"What's the reason that everything goes awry?" said Phineas,
bitterly.
"When I mentioned your name to Kennedy the other day, he looked as
black as thunder. But it is not odd that any one should quarrel with
him. I can't stand him. Do you know, I sometimes think that Laura
will have to give it up. Then there will be another mess in the
family!"
This was all very well as coming from Lord Chiltern; but there was no
word about Violet, and Phineas did not know how to get a word from
any one. Lady Laura could have told him everything, but he could not
go to Lady Laura. He did go to Lady Baldock's house as often as he
thought he could with propriety, and occasionally he saw Violet. But
he could do no more than see her, and the days and weeks were passing
by, and the time was coming in which he would have to go away, and be
with her no more. The end of the season, which was always to other
men,--to other working men such as our hero,--a period of pleasurable
anticipation, to him was a time of sadness, in which he felt that
he was not exactly like to, or even equal to, the men with whom he
lived in London. In the old days, in which he was allowed to go to
Loughlinter or to Saulsby, when all men and women were going to their
Loughlinters and their Saulsbys, it was very well with him; but there
was something melancholy to him in his yearly journey to Ireland. He
loved his father and mother and sisters as well as do other men; but
there was a falling off in the manner of his life which made him feel
that he had been in some sort out of his own element in London. He
would have liked to have shot grouse at Loughlinter, or pheasants at
Saulsby, or to have hunted down at Willingford,--or better still, to
have made love to Violet Effingham wherever Violet Effingham might
have placed herself. But all this was closed to him now; and there
would be nothing for him but to remain at Killaloe, or to return
to his work in Downing Street, from August to February. Mr. Monk,
indeed, was going with him for a few weeks; but even this association
did not make up for that sort of society which he would have
preferred.
The session went on very quietly. The question of the Irish Reform
Bill was postponed till the next year, which was a great thing
gained. He carried his bill about the Canada Railway, with sundry
other small bills appertaining to it, through the House in a manner
which redounded infinitely to his credit. There was just enough
of opposition to give a zest to the work, and to make the affair
conspicuous among the affairs of the year. As his chief was in the
other house, the work fell altogether into his hands, so that he came
to be conspicuous among Under-Secretaries. It was only when he said
a word to any leaders of his party about other matters,--about Irish
Tenant-right, for instance, which was beginning to loom very large,
that he found himself to be snubbed. But there was no room for action
this year in reference to Irish Tenant-right, and therefore any deep
consideration of that discomfort might be legitimately postponed. If
he did by chance open his mouth on the subject to Mr. Monk, even Mr.
Monk discouraged him.
In the early days of July, when the weather was very hot, and people
were beginning to complain of the Thames, and members were becoming
thirsty after grouse, and the remaining days of parliamentary work
were being counted up, there came to him news,--news that was soon
known throughout the fashionable world,--that the Duke of Omnium was
going to give a garden party at a certain villa residence on the
banks of the Thames above Richmond. It was to be such a garden party
as had never been seen before. And it would be the more remarkable
because the Duke had never been known to do such a thing. The villa
was called The Horns, and had, indeed, been given by the Duke to
Lady Glencora on her marriage; but the party was to be the Duke's
party, and The Horns, with all its gardens, conservatories, lawns,
shrubberies, paddocks, boat-houses, and boats, was to be made bright
and beautiful for the occasion. Scores of workmen were about the
place through the three first weeks of July. The world at large did
not at all know why the Duke was doing so unwonted a thing,--why
he should undertake so new a trouble. But Lady Glencora knew, and
Madame Goesler shrewdly guessed, the riddle. When Madame Goesler's
unexpected refusal had reached his Grace, he felt that he must either
accept the lady's refusal, or persevere. After a day's consideration,
he resolved that he would accept it. The top brick of the chimney was
very desirable; but perhaps it might be well that he should endeavour
to live without it. Then, accepting this refusal, he must either
stand his ground and bear the blow,--or he must run away to that
villa at Como, or elsewhere. The running away seemed to him at first
to be the better, or at least the more pleasant, course; but at last
he determined that he would stand his ground and bear the blow.
Therefore he gave his garden party at The Horns.
Who was to be invited? Before the first week in July was over, many
a bosom in London was fluttering with anxiety on that subject. The
Duke, in giving his short word of instruction to Lady Glencora,
made her understand that he would wish her to be particular in her
invitations. Her Royal Highness the Princess, and his Royal Highness
the Prince, had both been so gracious as to say that they would
honour his fête. The Duke himself had made out a short list, with not
more than a dozen names. Lady Glencora was employed to select the
real crowd,--the five hundred out of the ten thousand who were to
be blessed. On the Duke's own private list was the name of Madame
Goesler. Lady Glencora understood it all. When Madame Goesler got her
card, she thought that she understood it too. And she thought also
that the Duke was behaving in a gallant way.
There was, no doubt, much difficulty about the invitations, and a
considerable amount of ill-will was created. And they who considered
themselves entitled to be asked, and were not asked, were full of
wrath against their more fortunate friends, instead of being angry
with the Duke or with Lady Glencora, who had neglected them. It was
soon known that Lady Glencora was the real dispenser of the favours,
and I fancy that her ladyship was tired of her task before it was
completed. The party was to take place on Wednesday, the 27th of
July, and before the day had come, men and women had become so hardy
in the combat that personal applications were made with unflinching
importunity; and letters were written to Lady Glencora putting
forward this claim and that claim with a piteous clamour. "No, that
is too bad," Lady Glencora said to her particular friend, Mrs. Grey,
when a letter came from Mrs. Bonteen, stating all that her husband
had ever done towards supporting Mr. Palliser in Parliament,--and all
that he ever would do. "She shan't have it, even though she could put
Plantagenet into a minority to-morrow."
Mrs. Bonteen did not get a card; and when she heard that Phineas Finn
had received one, her wrath against Phineas was very great. He was
"an Irish adventurer," and she regretted deeply that Mr. Bonteen had
ever interested himself in bringing such an upstart forward in the
world of politics. But as Mr. Bonteen never had done anything towards
bringing Phineas forward, there was not much cause for regret on this
head. Phineas, however, got his card, and, of course, accepted the
invitation.
The grounds were opened at four. There was to be an early dinner out
in tents at five; and after dinner men and women were to walk about,
or dance, or make love--or hay, as suited them. The haycocks,
however, were ready prepared, while it was expected that they should
bring the love with them. Phineas, knowing that he should meet Violet
Effingham, took a great deal with him ready made.
For an hour and a half Lady Glencora kept her position in a saloon
through which the guests passed to the grounds, and to every comer
she imparted the information that the Duke was on the lawn;--to every
comer but one. To Madame Goesler she said no such word. "So glad to
see you, my dear," she said, as she pressed her friend's hand: "if I
am not killed by this work, I'll make you out again by-and-by." Then
Madame Goesler passed on, and soon found herself amidst a throng
of acquaintance. After a few minutes she saw the Duke seated in an
arm-chair, close to the river-bank, and she bravely went up to him,
and thanked him for the invitation. "The thanks are due to you for
gracing our entertainment," said the Duke, rising to greet her. There
were a dozen people standing round, and so the thing was done without
difficulty. At that moment there came a notice that their royal
highnesses were on the ground, and the Duke, of course, went off to
meet them. There was not a word more spoken between the Duke and
Madame Goesler on that afternoon.
Phineas did not come till late,--till seven, when the banquet was
over. I think he was right in this, as the banqueting in tents loses
in comfort almost more than it gains in romance. A small picnic may
be very well, and the distance previously travelled may give to a
dinner on the ground the seeming excuse of necessity. Frail human
nature must be supported,--and human nature, having gone so far
in pursuit of the beautiful, is entitled to what best support the
unaccustomed circumstances will allow. Therefore, out with the cold
pies, out with the salads, and the chickens, and the champagne. Since
no better may be, let us recruit human nature sitting upon this moss,
and forget our discomforts in the glory of the verdure around us. And
dear Mary, seeing that the cushion from the waggonet is small, and
not wishing to accept the too generous offer that she should take it
all for her own use, will admit a contact somewhat closer than the
ordinary chairs of a dining-room render necessary. That in its way is
very well;--but I hold that a banquet on narrow tables in a tent is
displeasing.
Phineas strolled into the grounds when the tent was nearly empty, and
when Lady Glencora, almost sinking beneath her exertions, was taking
rest in an inner room. The Duke at this time was dining with their
royal highnesses, and three or four others, specially selected,
very comfortably within doors. Out of doors the world had begun to
dance,--and the world was beginning to say that it would be much
nicer to go and dance upon the boards inside as soon as possible.
For, though of all parties a garden party is the nicest, everybody
is always anxious to get out of the garden as quick as may be. A few
ardent lovers of suburban picturesque effect were sitting beneath the
haycocks, and four forlorn damsels were vainly endeavouring to excite
the sympathy of manly youth by playing croquet in a corner. I am not
sure, however, that the lovers beneath the haycocks and the players
at croquet were not actors hired by Lady Glencora for the occasion.
Phineas had not been long on the lawn before he saw Lady Laura
Kennedy. She was standing with another lady, and Barrington Erle was
with them. "So you have been successful?" said Barrington, greeting
him.
"Successful in what?"
"In what? In getting a ticket. I have had to promise three
tide-waiterships, and to give deep hints about a bishopric expected
to be vacant, before I got in. But what matters? Success pays for
everything. My only trouble now is how I'm to get back to London."
Lady Laura shook hands with Phineas, and then as he was passing on,
followed him for a step and whispered a word to him. "Mr. Finn," she
said, "if you are not going yet, come back to me presently. I have
something to say to you. I shall not be far from the river, and shall
stay here for about an hour."
Phineas said that he would, and then went on, not knowing exactly
where he was going. He had one desire,--to find Violet Effingham, but
when he should find her he could not carry her off, and sit with her
beneath a haycock.
CHAPTER LXIV
The Horns
While looking for Violet Effingham, Phineas encountered Madame
Goesler, among a crowd of people who were watching the adventurous
embarkation of certain daring spirits in a pleasure-boat. There were
watermen there in the Duke's livery, ready to take such spirits down
to Richmond or up to Teddington lock, and many daring spirits did
take such trips,--to the great peril of muslins, ribbons, and starch,
to the peril also of ornamental summer white garments, so that when
the thing was over, the boats were voted to have been a bore.
"Are you going to venture?" said Phineas to the lady.
"I should like it of all things if I were not afraid for my clothes.
Will you come?"
"I was never good upon the water. I should be sea-sick to a
certainty. They are going down beneath the bridge too, and we should
be splashed by the steamers. I don't think my courage is high
enough." Thus Phineas excused himself, being still intent on
prosecuting his search for Violet.
"Then neither will I," said Madame Goesler. "One dash from a peccant
oar would destroy the whole symmetry of my dress. Look. That green
young lady has already been sprinkled."
"But the blue young gentleman has been sprinkled also," said Phineas,
"and they will be happy in a joint baptism." Then they strolled along
the river path together, and were soon alone. "You will be leaving
town soon, Madame Goesler?"
"Almost immediately."
"And where do you go?"
"Oh,--to Vienna. I am there for a couple of months every year,
minding my business. I wonder whether you would know me, if you saw
me;--sometimes sitting on a stool in a counting-house, sometimes
going about among old houses, settling what must be done to save them
from tumbling down. I dress so differently at such times, and talk so
differently, and look so much older, that I almost fancy myself to be
another person."
"Is it a great trouble to you?"
"No,--I rather like it. It makes me feel that I do something in the
world."
"Do you go alone?"
"Quite alone. I take a German maid with me, and never speak a word to
any one else on the journey."
"That must be very bad," said Phineas.
"Yes; it is the worst of it. But then I am so much accustomed to be
alone. You see me in society, and in society only, and therefore
naturally look upon me as one of a gregarious herd; but I am in truth
an animal that feeds alone and lives alone. Take the hours of the
year all through, and I am a solitary during four-fifths of them. And
what do you intend to do?"
"I go to Ireland."
"Home to your own people. How nice! I have no people to go to. I
have one sister, who lives with her husband at Riga. She is my only
relation, and I never see her."
"But you have thousands of friends in England."
"Yes,--as you see them,"--and she turned and spread out her hands
towards the crowded lawn, which was behind them. "What are such
friends worth? What would they do for me?"
"I do not know that the Duke would do much," said Phineas laughing.
Madame Goesler laughed also. "The Duke is not so bad," she said. "The
Duke would do as much as any one else. I won't have the Duke abused."
"He may be your particular friend, for what I know," said Phineas.
"Ah;--no. I have no particular friend. And were I to wish to choose
one, I should think the Duke a little above me."
"Oh, yes;--and too stiff, and too old, and too pompous, and too cold,
and too make-believe, and too gingerbread."
"Mr. Finn!"
"The Duke is all buckram, you know."
"Then why do you come to his house?"
"To see you, Madame Goesler."
"Is that true, Mr. Finn?"
"Yes;--it is true in its way. One goes about to meet those whom one
likes, not always for the pleasure of the host's society. I hope I am
not wrong because I go to houses at which I like neither the host nor
the hostess." Phineas as he said this was thinking of Lady Baldock,
to whom of late he had been exceedingly civil,--but he certainly did
not like Lady Baldock.
"I think you have been too hard upon the Duke of Omnium. Do you know
him well?"
"Personally? certainly not. Do you? Does anybody?"
"I think he is a gracious gentleman," said Madame Goesler, "and
though I cannot boast of knowing him well, I do not like to hear him
called buckram. I do not think he is buckram. It is not very easy for
a man in his position to live so as to please all people. He has to
maintain the prestige of the highest aristocracy in Europe."
"Look at his nephew, who will be the next Duke, and who works as hard
as any man in the country. Will he not maintain it better? What good
did the present man ever do?"
"You believe only in motion, Mr. Finn;--and not at all in quiescence.
An express train at full speed is grander to you than a mountain with
heaps of snow. I own that to me there is something glorious in the
dignity of a man too high to do anything,--if only he knows how to
carry that dignity with a proper grace. I think that there should be
breasts made to carry stars."
"Stars which they have never earned," said Phineas.
"Ah;--well; we will not fight about it. Go and earn your star, and I
will say that it becomes you better than any glitter on the coat of
the Duke of Omnium." This she said with an earnestness which he could
not pretend not to notice or not to understand. "I too may be able to
see that the express train is really greater than the mountain."
"Though, for your own life, you would prefer to sit and gaze upon the
snowy peaks?"
"No;--that is not so. For myself, I would prefer to be of use
somewhere,--to some one, if it were possible. I strive sometimes."
"And I am sure successfully."
"Never mind. I hate to talk about myself. You and the Duke are
fair subjects for conversation; you as the express train, who will
probably do your sixty miles an hour in safety, but may possibly go
down a bank with a crash."
"Certainly I may," said Phineas.
"And the Duke, as the mountain, which is fixed in its stateliness,
short of the power of some earthquake, which shall be grander and
more terrible than any earthquake yet known. Here we are at the house
again. I will go in and sit down for a while."
"If I leave you, Madame Goesler, I will say good-bye till next
winter."
"I shall be in town again before Christmas, you know. You will come
and see me?"
"Of course I will."
"And then this love trouble of course will be over,--one way or the
other;--will it not?"
"Ah!--who can say?"
"Faint heart never won fair lady. But your heart is never faint.
Farewell."
Then he left her. Up to this moment he had not seen Violet, and yet
he knew that she was to be there. She had herself told him that she
was to accompany Lady Laura, whom he had already met. Lady Baldock
had not been invited, and had expressed great animosity against the
Duke in consequence. She had gone so far as to say that the Duke was
a man at whose house a young lady such as her niece ought not to be
seen. But Violet had laughed at this, and declared her intention of
accepting the invitation. "Go," she had said; "of course I shall go.
I should have broken my heart if I could not have got there." Phineas
therefore was sure that she must be in the place. He had kept his
eyes ever on the alert, and yet he had not found her. And now he must
keep his appointment with Lady Laura Kennedy. So he went down to the
path by the river, and there he found her seated close by the water's
edge. Her cousin Barrington Erle was still with her, but as soon as
Phineas joined them, Erle went away. "I had told him," said Lady
Laura, "that I wished to speak to you, and he stayed with me till you
came. There are worse men than Barrington a great deal."
"I am sure of that."
"Are you and he still friends, Mr. Finn?"
"I hope so. I do not see so much of him as I did when I had less to
do."
"He says that you have got into altogether a different set."
"I don't know that. I have gone as circumstances have directed me,
but I have certainly not intended to throw over so old and good a
friend as Barrington Erle."
"Oh,--he does not blame you. He tells me that you have found your
way among what he calls the working men of the party, and he thinks
you will do very well,--if you can only be patient enough. We all
expected a different line from you, you know,--more of words and
less of deeds, if I may say so;--more of liberal oratory and less of
government action; but I do not doubt that you are right."
"I think that I have been wrong," said Phineas. "I am becoming
heartily sick of officialities."
"That comes from the fickleness about which papa is so fond of
quoting his Latin. The ox desires the saddle. The charger wants to
plough."
"And which am I?"
"Your career may combine the dignity of the one with the utility of
the other. At any rate you must not think of changing now. Have you
seen Mr. Kennedy lately?" She asked the question abruptly, showing
that she was anxious to get to the matter respecting which she had
summoned him to her side, and that all that she had said hitherto had
been uttered as it were in preparation of that subject.
"Seen him? yes; I see him daily. But we hardly do more than speak,"
"Why not?" Phineas stood for a moment in silence, hesitating. "Why is
it that he and you do not speak?"
"How can I answer that question, Lady Laura?"
"Do you know any reason? Sit down, or, if you please, I will get up
and walk with you. He tells me that you have chosen to quarrel with
him, and that I have made you do so. He says that you have confessed
to him that I have asked you to quarrel with him."
"He can hardly have said that."
"But he has said it,--in so many words. Do you think that I would
tell you such a story falsely?"
"Is he here now?"
"No;--he is not here. He would not come. I came alone."
"Is not Miss Effingham with you?"
"No;--she is to come with my father later. She is here no doubt, now.
But answer my question, Mr. Finn;--unless you find that you cannot
answer it. What was it that you did say to my husband?"
"Nothing to justify what he has told you."
"Do you mean to say that he has spoken falsely?"
"I mean to use no harsh word,--but I think that Mr. Kennedy when
troubled in his spirit looks at things gloomily, and puts meaning
upon words which they should not bear."
"And what has troubled his spirit?"
"You must know that better than I can do, Lady Laura. I will tell you
all that I can tell you. He invited me to his house and I would not
go, because you had forbidden me. Then he asked me some questions
about you. Did I refuse because of you,--or of anything that you had
said? If I remember right, I told him that I did fancy that you would
not be glad to see me,--and that therefore I would rather stay away.
What was I to say?"
"You should have said nothing."
"Nothing with him would have been worse than what I did say. Remember
that he asked me the question point-blank, and that no reply would
have been equal to an affirmation. I should have confessed that his
suggestion was true."
"He could not then have twitted me with your words."
"If I have erred, Lady Laura, and brought any sorrow on you, I am
indeed grieved."
"It is all sorrow. There is nothing but sorrow. I have made up my
mind to leave him."
"Oh, Lady Laura!"
"It is very bad,--but not so bad, I think, as the life I am now
leading. He has accused me--, of what do you think? He says that you
are my lover!"
"He did not say that,--in those words?"
"He said it in words which made me feel that I must part from him."
"And how did you answer him?"
"I would not answer him at all. If he had come to me like a man,--not
accusing me, but asking me,--I would have told him everything. And
what was there to tell? I should have broken my faith to you, in
speaking of that scene at Loughlinter, but women always tell such
stories to their husbands when their husbands are good to them, and
true, and just. And it is well that they should be told. But to Mr.
Kennedy I can tell nothing. He does not believe my word."
"Not believe you, Lady Laura?"
"No! Because I did not blurt out to him all that story about your
foolish duel,--because I thought it best to keep my brother's secret,
as long as there was a secret to be kept, he told me that I
had,--lied to him!"
"What!--with that word?"
"Yes,--with that very word. He is not particular about his words,
when he thinks it necessary to express himself strongly. And he has
told me since that because of that he could never believe me again.
How is it possible that a woman should live with such a man?" But
why did she come to him with this story,--to him whom she had been
accused of entertaining as a lover;--to him who of all her friends
was the last whom she should have chosen as the recipient for such a
tale? Phineas as he thought how he might best answer her, with what
words he might try to comfort her, could not but ask himself this
question. "The moment that the word was out of his mouth," she went
on to say, "I resolved that I would tell you. The accusation is
against you as it is against me, and is equally false to both. I
have written to him, and there is my letter."
"But you will see him again?"
"No;--I will go to my father's house. I have already arranged it. Mr.
Kennedy has my letter by this time, and I go from hence home with my
father."
"Do you wish that I should read the letter?"
"Yes,--certainly. I wish that you should read it. Should I ever meet
him again, I shall tell him that you saw it."
They were now standing close upon the river's bank, at a corner of
the grounds, and, though the voices of people sounded near to them,
they were alone. Phineas had no alternative but to read the letter,
which was as follows:--
After what you have said to me it is impossible that I
should return to your house. I shall meet my father at the
Duke of Omnium's, and have already asked him to give me an
asylum. It is my wish to remain wherever he may be, either
in town or in the country. Should I change my purpose in
this, and change my residence, I will not fail to let you
know where I go and what I propose to do. You I think must
have forgotten that I was your wife; but I will never
forget it.
You have accused me of having a lover. You cannot have
expected that I should continue to live with you after
such an accusation. For myself I cannot understand how
any man can have brought himself to bring such a charge
against his wife. Even had it been true the accusation
should not have been made by your mouth to my ears.
That it is untrue I believe you must be as well aware as
I am myself. How intimate I was with. Mr. Finn, and what
were the limits of my intimacy with him you knew before
I married you. After our marriage I encouraged his
friendship till I found that there was something in
it that displeased you,--and, after learning that, I
discouraged it. You have said that he is my lover, but
you have probably not defined for yourself that word very
clearly. You have felt yourself slighted because his name
has been mentioned with praise;--and your jealousy has
been wounded because you have thought that I have regarded
him as in some way superior to yourself. You have never
really thought that he was my lover,--that he spoke words
to me which others might not hear, that he claimed from
me aught that a wife may not give, that he received aught
which a friend should not receive. The accusation has been
a coward's accusation.
I shall be at my father's to-night, and to-morrow I will
get you to let my servant bring to me such things as are
my own,--my clothes, namely, and desk, and a few books.
She will know what I want. I trust you may be happier
without a wife, than ever you have been with me. I have
felt almost daily since we were married that you were a
man who would have been happier without a wife than with
one.
Yours affectionately,
LAURA KENNEDY.
"It is at any rate true," she said, when Phineas had read the letter.
"True! Doubtless it is true," said Phineas, "except that I do not
suppose he was ever really angry with me, or jealous, or anything of
the sort,--because I got on well. It seems absurd even to think it."
"There is nothing too absurd for some men. I remember your telling
me that he was weak, and poor, and unworthy. I remember your saying
so when I first thought that he might become my husband. I wish I
had believed you when you told me so. I should not have made such a
shipwreck of myself as I have done. That is all I had to say to you.
After what has passed between us I did not choose that you should
hear how I was separated from my husband from any lips but my own.
I will go now and find papa. Do not come with me. I prefer being
alone." Then he was left standing by himself, looking down upon the
river as it glided by. How would it have been with both of them if
Lady Laura had accepted him three years ago, when she consented to
join her lot with that of Mr. Kennedy, and had rejected him? As he
stood he heard the sound of music from the house, and remembered
that he had come there with the one sole object of seeing Violet
Effingham. He had known that he would meet Lady Laura, and it had
been in his mind to break through that law of silence which she had
imposed upon him, and once more to ask her to assist him,--to implore
her for the sake of their old friendship to tell him whether there
might yet be for him any chance of success. But in the interview
which had just taken place it had been impossible for him to speak
a word of himself or of Violet. To her, in her great desolation,
he could address himself on no other subject than that of her own
misery. But not the less when she was talking to him of her own
sorrow, of her regret that she had not listened to him when in years
past he had spoken slightingly of Mr. Kennedy, was he thinking of
Violet Effingham. Mr. Kennedy had certainly mistaken the signs of
things when he had accused his wife by saying that Phineas was her
lover. Phineas had soon got over that early feeling; and as far as he
himself was concerned had never regretted Lady Laura's marriage.
He remained down by the water for a few minutes, giving Lady Laura
time to escape, and then he wandered across the grounds towards the
house. It was now about nine o'clock, and though there were still
many walking about the grounds, the crowd of people were in the
rooms. The musicians were ranged out on a verandah, so that their
music might have been available for dancing within or without; but
the dancers had found the boards pleasanter than the lawn, and the
Duke's garden party was becoming a mere ball, with privilege for the
dancers to stroll about the lawn between the dances. And in this
respect the fun was better than at a ball,--that let the engagements
made for partners be what they might, they could always be broken
with ease. No lady felt herself bound to dance with a cavalier who
was displeasing to her; and some gentlemen were left sadly in the
lurch. Phineas felt himself to be very much in the lurch, even after
he had discovered Violet Effingham standing up to dance with Lord
Fawn.
He bided his time patiently, and at last he found his opportunity.
"Would she dance with him?" She declared that she intended to dance
no more, and that she had promised to be ready to return home with
Lord Brentford before ten o'clock. "I have pledged myself not to be
after ten," she said, laughing. Then she put her hand upon his arm,
and they stepped out upon the terrace together. "Have you heard
anything?" she asked him, almost in a whisper.
"Yes," he said. "I have heard what you mean. I have heard it all."
"Is it not dreadful?"
"I fear it is the best thing she can do. She has never been happy
with him."
"But to be accused after that fashion,--by her husband!" said Violet.
"One can hardly believe it in these days. And of all women she is the
last to deserve such accusation."
"The very last," said Phineas, feeling that the subject was one upon
which it was not easy for him to speak.
"I cannot conceive to whom he can have alluded," said Violet. Then
Phineas began to understand that Violet had not heard the whole
story; but the difficulty of speaking was still very great.
"It has been the result of ungovernable temper," he said.
"But a man does not usually strive to dishonour himself because he
is in a rage. And this man is incapable of rage. He must be cursed
with one of those dark gloomy minds in which love always leads to
jealousy. She will never return to him."
"One cannot say. In many respects it would be better that she
should," said Phineas.
"She will never return to him," repeated Violet,--"never. Would you
advise her to do so?"
"How can I say? If one were called upon for advice, one would think
so much before one spoke."
"I would not,--not for a minute. What! to be accused of that! How are
a man and woman to live together after there have been such words
between them? Poor Laura! What a terrible end to all her high hopes!
Do you not grieve for her?"
They were now at some distance from the house, and Phineas could not
but feel that chance had been very good to him in giving him his
opportunity. She was leaning on his arm, and they were alone, and she
was speaking to him with all the familiarity of old friendship. "I
wonder whether I may change the subject," said he, "and ask you a
word about yourself?"
"What word?" she said sharply.
"I have heard--"
"What have you heard?"
"Simply this,--that you are not now as you were six months ago. Your
marriage was then fixed for June."
"It has been unfixed since then," she said.
"Yes;--it has been unfixed. I know it. Miss Effingham, you will not
be angry with me if I say that when I heard it was so, something of a
hope,--no, I must not call it a hope,--something that longed to form
itself into hope returned to my breast, and from that hour to this
has been the only subject on which I have cared to think."
"Lord Chiltern is your friend, Mr. Finn?"
"He is so, and I do not think that I have ever been untrue to my
friendship for him."
"He says that no man has ever had a truer friend. He will swear to
that in all companies. And I, when it was allowed to me to swear with
him, swore it too. As his friend, let me tell you one thing,--one
thing which I would never tell to any other man,--one thing which I
know I may tell you in confidence. You are a gentleman, and will not
break my confidence?"
"I think I will not."
"I know you will not, because you are a gentleman. I told Lord
Chiltern in the autumn of last year that I loved him. And I did love
him. I shall never have the same confession to make to another man.
That he and I are not now,--on those loving terms,--which once
existed, can make no difference in that. A woman cannot transfer her
heart. There have been things which have made me feel,--that I was
perhaps mistaken,--in saying that I would be,--his wife. But I said
so, and cannot now give myself to another. Here is Lord Brentford,
and we will join him." There was Lord Brentford with Lady Laura on
his arm, very gloomy,--resolving on what way he might be avenged on
the man who had insulted his daughter. He took but little notice
of Phineas as he resumed his charge of Miss Effingham; but the two
ladies wished him good night.
"Good night, Lady Laura," said Phineas, standing with his hat in his
hand,--"good night, Miss Effingham." Then he was alone,--quite alone.
Would it not be well for him to go down to the bottom of the garden,
and fling himself into the quiet river, so that there might be an
end of him? Or would it not be better still that he should create
for himself some quiet river of life, away from London, away from
politics, away from lords, and titled ladies, and fashionable
squares, and the parties given by dukes, and the disappointments
incident to a small man in attempting to make for himself a career
among big men? There had frequently been in the mind of this young
man an idea that there was something almost false in his own
position,--that his life was a pretence, and that he would ultimately
be subject to that ruin which always comes, sooner or later, on
things which are false; and now as he wandered alone about Lady
Glencora's gardens, this feeling was very strong within his bosom,
and robbed him altogether of the honour and glory of having been one
of the Duke of Omnium's guests.
CHAPTER LXV
The Cabinet Minister at Killaloe
Phineas did not throw himself into the river from the Duke's garden;
and was ready, in spite of Violet Effingham, to start for Ireland
with Mr. Monk at the end of the first week in August. The close of
that season in London certainly was not a happy period of his life.
Violet had spoken to him after such a fashion that he could not bring
himself not to believe her. She had given him no hint whether it was
likely or unlikely that she and Lord Chiltern would be reconciled;
but she had convinced him that he could not be allowed to take Lord
Chiltern's place. "A woman cannot transfer her heart," she had said.
Phineas was well aware that many women do transfer their hearts;
but he had gone to this woman too soon after the wrench which her
love had received; he had been too sudden with his proposal for a
transfer; and the punishment for such ill judgment must be that
success would now be impossible to him. And yet how could he have
waited, feeling that Miss Effingham, if she were at all like other
girls whom he had known, might have promised herself to some other
lover before she would return within his reach in the succeeding
spring? But she was not like some other girls. Ah;--he knew that now,
and repented him of his haste.
But he was ready for Mr. Monk on the 7th of August, and they started
together. Something less than twenty hours took them from London to
Killaloe, and during four or five of those twenty hours Mr. Monk
was unfitted for any conversation by the uncomfortable feelings
incidental to the passage from Holyhead to Kingstown. Nevertheless,
there was a great deal of conversation between them during the
journey. Mr. Monk had almost made up his mind to leave the Cabinet.
"It is sad to me to have to confess it," he said, "but the truth is
that my old rival, Turnbull, is right. A man who begins his political
life as I began mine, is not the man of whom a Minister should
be formed. I am inclined to think that Ministers of Government
require almost as much education in their trade as shoemakers or
tallow-chandlers. I doubt whether you can make a good public servant
of a man simply because he has got the ear of the House of Commons."
"Then you mean to say," said Phineas, "that we are altogether wrong
from beginning to end, in our way of arranging these things?"
"I do not say that at all. Look at the men who have been leading
statesmen since our present mode of government was formed,--from the
days in which it was forming itself, say from Walpole down, and you
will find that all who have been of real use had early training as
public servants."
"Are we never to get out of the old groove?"
"Not if the groove is good," said Mr. Monk, "Those who have been
efficient as ministers sucked in their efficacy with their mother's
milk. Lord Brock did so, and Lord de Terrier, and Mr. Mildmay. They
seated themselves in office chairs the moment they left college.
Mr. Gresham was in office before he was eight-and-twenty. The
Duke of St. Bungay was at work as a Private Secretary when he was
three-and-twenty. You, luckily for yourself, have done the same."
"And regret it every hour of my life."
"You have no cause for regret, but it is not so with me. If there be
any man unfitted by his previous career for office, it is he who has
become, or who has endeavoured to become, a popular politician,--an
exponent, if I may say so, of public opinion. As far as I can see,
office is offered to such men with one view only,--that of clipping
their wings."
"And of obtaining their help."
"It is the same thing. Help from Turnbull would mean the withdrawal
of all power of opposition from him. He could not give other help for
any long term, as the very fact of his accepting power and patronage
would take from him his popular leadership. The masses outside
require to have their minister as the Queen has hers; but the same
man cannot be minister to both. If the people's minister chooses to
change his master, and to take the Queen's shilling, something of
temporary relief may be gained by government in the fact that the
other place will for a time be vacant. But there are candidates
enough for such places, and the vacancy is not a vacancy long. Of
course the Crown has this pull, that it pays wages, and the people do
not."
"I do not think that that influenced you," said Phineas.
"It did not influence me. To you I will make bold to state so much
positively, though it would be foolish, perhaps, to do so to others.
I did not go for the shilling, though I am so poor a man that the
shilling is more to me than it would be to almost any man in the
House. I took the shilling, much doubting, but guided in part by
this, that I was ashamed of being afraid to take it. They told
me,--Mr. Mildmay and the Duke,--that I could earn it to the benefit
of the country. I have not earned it, and the country has not been
benefited,--unless it be for the good of the country that my voice in
the House should be silenced. If I believe that, I ought to hold my
tongue without taking a salary for holding it. I have made a mistake,
my friend. Such mistakes made at my time of life cannot be wholly
rectified; but, being convinced of my error, I must do the best in my
power to put myself right again."
There was a bitterness in all this to Phineas himself of which he
could not but make plaint to his companion. "The truth is," he said,
"that a man in office must be a slave, and that slavery is
distasteful."
"There I think you are wrong. If you mean that you cannot do joint
work with other men altogether after your own fashion the same may be
said of all work. If you had stuck to the Bar you must have pleaded
your causes in conformity with instructions from the attorneys."
"I should have been guided by my own lights in advising those
attorneys."
"I cannot see that you suffer anything that ought to go against the
grain with you. You are beginning young, and it is your first adopted
career. With me it is otherwise. If by my telling you this I shall
have led you astray, I shall regret my openness with you. Could I
begin again, I would willingly begin as you began."
It was a great day in Killaloe, that on which Mr. Monk arrived with
Phineas at the doctor's house. In London, perhaps, a bishop inspires
more awe than a Cabinet Minister. In Killaloe, where a bishop might
be seen walking about every day, the mitred dignitary of the Church,
though much loved, was thought of, I fear, but lightly; whereas a
Cabinet Minister coming to stay in the house of a townsman was a
thing to be wondered at, to be talked about, to be afraid of, to be
a fruitful source of conversation for a year to come. There were
many in Killaloe, especially among the elder ladies, who had shaken
their heads and expressed the saddest doubts when young Phineas Finn
had first become a Parliament man. And though by degrees they had
been half brought round, having been driven to acknowledge that he
had been wonderfully successful as a Parliament man, still they
had continued to shake their heads among themselves, and to fear
something in the future,--until he appeared at his old home leading a
Cabinet Minister by the hand. There was such assurance in this that
even old Mrs. Callaghan, at the brewery, gave way, and began to say
all manner of good things, and to praise the doctor's luck in that he
had a son gifted with parts so excellent. There was a great desire to
see the Cabinet Minister in the flesh, to be with him when he ate and
drank, to watch the gait and countenance of the man, and to drink
water from this fountain of state lore which had been so wonderfully
brought among them by their young townsman. Mrs. Finn was aware that
it behoved her to be chary of her invitations, but the lady from the
brewery had said such good things of Mrs. Finn's black swan, that she
carried her point, and was invited to meet the Cabinet Minister at
dinner on the day after his arrival.
Mrs. Flood Jones and her daughter were invited also to be of the
party. When Phineas had been last at Killaloe, Mrs. Flood Jones,
as the reader may remember, had remained with her daughter at
Floodborough,--feeling it to be her duty to keep her daughter away
from the danger of an unrequited attachment. But it seemed that
her purpose was changed now, or that she no longer feared the
danger,--for both Mary and her mother were now again living in
Killaloe, and Mary was at the doctor's house as much as ever.
A day or two before the coming of the god and the demigod to the
little town, Barbara Finn and her friend had thus come to understand
each other as they walked along the Shannon side. "I am sure, my
dear, that he is engaged to nobody," said Barbara Finn.
"And I am sure, my dear," said Mary, "that I do not care whether he
is or is not."
"What do you mean, Mary?"
"I mean what I say. Why should I care? Five years ago I had a foolish
dream, and now I am awake again. Think how old I have got to be!"
"Yes;--you are twenty-three. What has that to do with it?"
"It has this to do with it;--that I am old enough to know better.
Mamma and I quite understand each other. She used to be angry with
him, but she has got over all that foolishness now. It always made me
so vexed;--the idea of being angry with a man because,--because--!
You know one can't talk about it, it is so foolish. But that is all
over now."
"Do you mean to say you don't care for him, Mary? Do you remember
what you used to swear to me less than two years ago?"
"I remember it all very well, and I remember what a goose I was. As
for caring for him, of course I do,--because he is your brother, and
because I have known him all my life. But if he were going to be
married to-morrow, you would see that it would make no difference to
me."
Barbara Finn walked on for a couple of minutes in silence before she
replied. "Mary," she said at last, "I don't believe a word of it."
"Very well;--then all that I shall ask of you is, that we may not
talk about him any more. Mamma believes it, and that is enough for
me." Nevertheless, they did talk about Phineas during the whole of
that day, and very often talked about him afterwards, as long as Mary
remained at Killaloe.
There was a large dinner party at the doctor's on the day after Mr.
Monk's arrival. The bishop was not there, though he was on terms
sufficiently friendly with the doctor's family to have been invited
on so grand an occasion; but he was not there, because Mrs. Finn
was determined that she would be taken out to dinner by a Cabinet
Minister in the face of all her friends. She was aware that had the
bishop been there, she must have taken the bishop's arm. And though
there would have been glory in that, the other glory was more to her
taste. It was the first time in her life that she had ever seen a
Cabinet Minister, and I think that she was a little disappointed at
finding him so like other middle-aged gentlemen. She had hoped that
Mr. Monk would have assumed something of the dignity of his position;
but he assumed nothing. Now the bishop, though he was a very mild
man, did assume something by the very facts of his apron and
knee-breeches.
"I am sure, sir, it is very good of you to come and put up with our
humble way of living," said Mrs. Finn to her guest, as they sat down
at table. And yet she had resolved that she would not make any speech
of the kind,--that she would condescend to no apology,--that she
would bear herself as though a Cabinet Minister dined with her at
least once a year. But when the moment came, she broke down, and made
this apology with almost abject meekness, and then hated herself
because she had done so.
"My dear madam," said Mr. Monk, "I live myself so much like a hermit
that your house is a palace of luxury to me." Then he felt that he
had made a foolish speech, and he also hated himself. He found it
very difficult to talk to his hostess upon any subject, until by
chance he mentioned his young friend Phineas. Then her tongue was
unloosed. "Your son, madam," he said, "is going with me to Limerick
and back to Dublin. It is a shame, I know, taking him so soon away
from home, but I should not know how to get on without him."
"Oh, Mr. Monk, it is such a blessing for him, and such an honour for
us, that you should be so good to him." Then the mother spoke out
all her past fears and all her present hopes, and acknowledged the
great glory which it was to her to have a son sitting in Parliament,
holding an office with a stately name and a great salary, and blessed
with the friendship of such a man as Mr. Monk. After that Mr. Monk
got on better with her.
"I don't know any young man," said he, "in whose career I have taken
so strong an interest."
"He was always good," said Mrs. Finn, with a tear forcing itself into
the corner of each eye. "I am his mother, and of course I ought not
to say so,--not in this way; but it is true, Mr. Monk." And then the
poor lady was obliged to raise her handkerchief and wipe away the
drops.
Phineas on this occasion had taken out to dinner the mother of his
devoted Mary, Mrs. Flood Jones. "What a pleasure it must be to the
doctor and Mrs. Finn to see you come back in this way," said Mrs.
Flood Jones.
"With all my bones unbroken?" said he, laughing.
"Yes; with all your bones unbroken. You know, Phineas, when we
first heard that you were to sit in Parliament, we were afraid that
you might break a rib or two,--since you choose to talk about the
breaking of bones."
"Yes, I know. Everybody thought I should come to grief; but nobody
felt so sure of it as I did myself."
"But you have not come to grief."
"I am not out of the wood yet, you know, Mrs. Flood Jones. There is
plenty of possibility for grief in my way still."
"As far as I can understand it, you are out of the wood. All that
your friends here want to see now is, that you should marry some nice
English girl, with a little money, if possible. Rumours have reached
us, you know."
"Rumours always lie," said Phineas.
"Sometimes they do, of course; and I am not going to ask any
indiscreet questions. But that is what we all hope. Mary was saying,
only the other day, that if you were once married, we should all
feel quite safe about you. And you know we all take the most lively
interest in your welfare. It is not every day that a man from County
Clare gets on as you have done, and therefore we are bound to think
of you." Thus Mrs. Flood Jones signified to Phineas Finn that she had
forgiven him the thoughtlessness of his early youth,--even though
there had been something of treachery in that thoughtlessness to her
own daughter; and showed him, also, that whatever Mary's feelings
might have been once, they were not now of a nature to trouble her.
"Of course you will marry?" said Mrs. Flood Jones.
"I should think very likely not," said Phineas, who perhaps looked
farther into the mind of the lady than the lady intended.
"Oh, do," said the lady. "Every man should marry as soon as he can,
and especially a man in your position."
When the ladies met together in the drawing-room after dinner,
it was impossible but that they should discuss Mr. Monk. There
was Mrs. Callaghan from the brewery there, and old Lady Blood, of
Bloodstone,--who on ordinary occasions would hardly admit that she
was on dining-out terms with any one in Killaloe except the bishop,
but who had found it impossible to decline to meet a Cabinet
Minister,--and there was Mrs. Stackpoole from Sixmiletown, a far-away
cousin of the Finns, who hated Lady Blood with a true provincial
hatred.
"I don't see anything particularly uncommon in him, after all," said
Lady Blood.
"I think he is very nice indeed," said Mrs. Flood Jones.
"So very quiet, my dear, and just like other people," said Mrs.
Callaghan, meaning to pronounce a strong eulogium on the Cabinet
Minister.
"Very like other people indeed," said Lady Blood.
"And what would you expect, Lady Blood?" said Mrs. Stackpoole. "Men
and women in London walk upon two legs, just as they do in Ennis."
Now Lady Blood herself had been born and bred in Ennis, whereas Mrs.
Stackpoole had come from Limerick, which is a much more considerable
town, and therefore there was a satire in this allusion to the habits
of the men of Ennis which Lady Blood understood thoroughly.
"My dear Mrs. Stackpoole, I know how the people walk in London quite
as well as you do." Lady Blood had once passed three months in London
while Sir Patrick had been alive, whereas Mrs. Stackpoole had never
done more than visit the metropolis for a day or two.
"Oh, no doubt," said Mrs. Stackpoole; "but I never can understand
what it is that people expect. I suppose Mr. Monk ought to have
come with his stars on the breast of his coat, to have pleased Lady
Blood."
"My dear Mrs. Stackpoole, Cabinet Ministers don't have stars," said
Lady Blood.
"I never said they did," said Mrs. Stackpoole.
"He is so nice and gentle to talk to," said Mrs. Finn. "You may say
what you will, but men who are high up do very often give themselves
airs. Now I must say that this friend of my son's does not do
anything of that kind."
"Not the least," said Mrs. Callaghan.
"Quite the contrary," said Mrs. Stackpoole.
"I dare say he is a wonderful man," said Lady Blood. "All I say is,
that I didn't hear anything wonderful come out of his mouth; and
as for people in Ennis walking on two legs, I have seen donkeys in
Limerick doing just the same thing." Now it was well known that Mrs.
Stackpoole had two sons living in Limerick, as to neither of whom
was it expected that he would set the Shannon on fire. After this
little speech there was no further mention of Mr. Monk, as it became
necessary that all the good-nature of Mrs. Finn and all the tact
of Mrs. Flood Jones and all the energy of Mrs. Callaghan should be
used, to prevent the raging of an internecine battle between Mrs.
Stackpoole and Lady Blood.
CHAPTER LXVI
Victrix
Mr. Monk's holiday programme allowed him a week at Killaloe, and
from thence he was to go to Limerick, and from Limerick to Dublin,
in order that, at both places, he might be entertained at a public
dinner and make a speech about tenant-right. Foreseeing that Phineas
might commit himself if he attended these meetings, Mr. Monk had
counselled him to remain at Killaloe. But Phineas had refused to
subject himself to such cautious abstinence. Mr. Monk had come to
Ireland as his friend, and he would see him through his travels. "I
shall not, probably, be asked to speak," said Phineas, "and if I am
asked, I need not say more than a few words. And what if I did speak
out?"
"You might find it disadvantageous to you in London."
"I must take my chance of that. I am not going to tie myself down for
ever and ever for the sake of being Under-Secretary to the Colonies."
Mr. Monk said very much to him on the subject,--was constantly saying
very much to him about it; but in spite of all that Mr. Monk said,
Phineas did make the journey to Limerick and Dublin.
He had not, since his arrival at Killaloe, been a moment alone with
Mary Flood Jones till the evening before he started with Mr. Monk.
She had kept out of his way successfully, though she had constantly
been with him in company, and was beginning to plume herself on the
strength and valour of her conduct. But her self-praise had in it
nothing of joy, and her glory was very sad. Of course she would care
for him no more,--more especially as it was so very evident that he
cared not at all for her. But the very fact of her keeping out of
his way, made her acknowledge to herself that her position was very
miserable. She had declared to her mother that she might certainly
go to Killaloe with safety,--that it would be better for her to put
herself in the way of meeting him as an old friend,--that the idea of
the necessity of shutting herself up because of his approach, was the
one thing that gave her real pain. Therefore her mother had brought
her to Killaloe and she had met him; but her fancied security had
deserted her, and she found herself to be miserable, hoping for
something she did not know what, still dreaming of possibilities,
feeling during every moment of his presence with her that some
special conduct was necessary on her part. She could not make further
confession to her mother and ask to be carried back to Floodborough;
but she knew that she was very wretched at Killaloe.
As for Phineas, he had felt that his old friend was very cold to him.
He was in that humour with reference to Violet Effingham which seemed
especially to require consolation. He knew now that all hope was
over there. Violet Effingham could never be his wife. Even were she
not to marry Lord Chiltern for the next five years, she would not,
during those five years, marry any other man. Such was our hero's
conviction; and, suffering under this conviction, he was in want of
the comfort of feminine sympathy. Had Mary known all this, and had it
suited her to play such a part, I think she might have had Phineas
at her feet before he had been a week at home. But she had kept
aloof from him and had heard nothing of his sorrows. As a natural
consequence of this, Phineas was more in love with her than ever.
On the evening before he started with Mr. Monk for Limerick, he
managed to be alone with her for a few minutes. Barbara may probably
have assisted in bringing about this arrangement, and had, perhaps,
been guilty of some treachery,--sisters in such circumstances will
sometimes be very treacherous to their friends. I feel sure, however,
that Mary herself was quite innocent of any guile in the matter.
"Mary," Phineas said to her suddenly, "it seems to me that you have
avoided me purposely ever since I have been at home." She smiled and
blushed, and stammered and said nothing. "Has there been any reason
for it, Mary?"
"No reason at all that I know of," she said.
"We used to be such great friends."
"That was before you were a great man, Phineas. It must necessarily
be different now. You know so many people now, and people of such a
different sort, that of course I fall a little into the background."
"When you talk in that way, Mary, I know that you are laughing at
me."
"Indeed, indeed I am not."
"I believe there is no one in the whole world," he said, after a
pause, "whose friendship is more to me than yours is. I think of it
so often, Mary. Say that when we come back it shall be between us as
it used to be." Then he put out his hand for hers, and she could not
help giving it to him. "Of course there will be people," he said,
"who talk nonsense, and one cannot help it; but I will not put up
with it from you."
"I did not mean to talk nonsense, Phineas!" Then there came some one
across them, and the conversation was ended; but the sound of his
voice remained on her ears, and she could not help but remember
that he had declared that her friendship was dearer to him than the
friendship of any one else.
Phineas went with Mr. Monk first to Limerick and then to Dublin, and
found himself at both places to be regarded as a hero only second
to the great hero. At both places the one subject of debate was
tenant-right;--could anything be done to make it profitable for men
with capital to put their capital into Irish land? The fertility of
the soil was questioned by no one,--nor the sufficiency of external
circumstances, such as railroads and the like;--nor the abundance of
labour;--nor even security for the wealth to be produced. The only
difficulty was in this, that the men who were to produce the wealth
had no guarantee that it would be theirs when it was created. In
England and elsewhere such guarantees were in existence. Might it not
be possible to introduce them into Ireland? That was the question
which Mr. Monk had in hand; and in various speeches which he made
both before and after the dinners given to him, he pledged himself to
keep it well in hand when Parliament should meet. Of course Phineas
spoke also. It was impossible that he should be silent when his
friend and leader was pouring out his eloquence. Of course he spoke,
and of course he pledged himself. Something like the old pleasures
of the debating society returned to him, as standing upon a platform
before a listening multitude, he gave full vent to his words. In
the House of Commons, of late he had been so cabined, cribbed, and
confined by office as to have enjoyed nothing of this. Indeed, from
the commencement of his career, he had fallen so thoroughly into the
decorum of Government ways, as to have missed altogether the delights
of that wild irresponsible oratory of which Mr. Monk had spoken
to him so often. He had envied men below the gangway, who, though
supporting the Government on main questions, could get up on their
legs whenever the House was full enough to make it worth their while,
and say almost whatever they pleased. There was that Mr. Robson, who
literally did say just what came uppermost; and the thing that came
uppermost was often ill-natured, often unbecoming the gravity of the
House, was always startling; but men listened to him and liked him to
speak. But Mr. Robson had--married a woman with money. Oh, why,--why,
had not Violet Effingham been kinder to him? He might even yet,
perhaps, marry a woman with money. But he could not bring himself to
do so unless he loved her.
The upshot of the Dublin meeting was that he also positively pledged
himself to support during the next session of Parliament a bill
advocating tenant-right. "I am sorry you went so far as that," Mr.
Monk said to him almost as soon as the meeting was over. They were
standing on the pier at Kingstown, and Mr. Monk was preparing to
return to England.
"And why not I as far as you?"
"Because I had thought about it, and I do not think that you have. I
am prepared to resign my office to-morrow; and directly that I can
see Mr. Gresham and explain to him what I have done, I shall offer to
do so."
"He won't accept your resignation."
"He must accept it, unless he is prepared to instruct the Irish
Secretary to bring in such a bill as I can support."
"I shall be exactly in the same boat."
"But you ought not to be in the same boat;--nor need you. My advice
to you is to say nothing about it till you get back to London, and
then speak to Lord Cantrip. Tell him that you will not say anything
on the subject in the House, but that in the event of there being a
division you hope to be allowed to vote as on an open question. It
may be that I shall get Gresham's assent, and if so we shall be all
right. If I do not, and if they choose to make it a point with you,
you must resign also."
"Of course I shall," said Phineas.
"But I do not think they will. You have been too useful, and they
will wish to avoid the weakness which comes to a ministry from
changing its team. Good-bye, my dear fellow; and remember this,--my
last word of advice to you is to stick by the ship. I am quite sure
it is a career which will suit you. I did not begin it soon enough."
Phineas was rather melancholy as he returned alone to Killaloe. It
was all very well to bid him stick to the ship, and he knew as well
as any one could tell him how material the ship was to him; but there
are circumstances in which a man cannot stick to his ship,--cannot
stick, at least, to this special Government ship. He knew that
whither Mr. Monk went, in this session, he must follow. He had
considerable hope that when Mr. Monk explained his purpose to the
Prime Minister, the Prime Minister would feel himself obliged to give
way. In that case Phineas would not only be able to keep his office,
but would have such an opportunity of making a speech in Parliament
as circumstances had never yet given to him. When he was again at
home he said nothing to his father or to the Killaloeians as to the
danger of his position. Of what use would it be to make his mother
and sisters miserable, or to incur the useless counsels of the
doctor? They seemed to think his speech at Dublin very fine, and were
never tired of talking of what Mr. Monk and Phineas were going to do;
but the idea had not come home to them that if Mr. Monk or Phineas
chose to do anything on their own account, they must give up the
places which they held under the Crown.
It was September when Phineas found himself back at Killaloe, and he
was due to be at his office in London in November. The excitement
of Mr. Monk's company was now over, and he had nothing to do but to
receive pouches full of official papers from the Colonial Office, and
study all the statistics which came within his reach in reference to
the proposed new law for tenant-right. In the meantime Mary was still
living with her mother at Killaloe, and still kept herself somewhat
aloof from the man she loved. How could it be possible for him not to
give way in such circumstances as those?
One day he found himself talking to her about himself, and speaking
to her of his own position with more frankness than he ever used with
his own family. He had begun by reminding her of that conversation
which they had had before he went away with Mr. Monk, and by
reminding her also that she had promised to return to her old
friendly ways with him.
"Nay, Phineas; there was no promise," she said.
"And are we not to be friends?"
"I only say that I made no particular promise. Of course we are
friends. We have always been friends."
"What would you say if you heard that I had resigned my office and
given up my seat?" he asked. Of course she expressed her surprise,
almost her horror, at such an idea, and then he told her everything.
It took long in the telling, because it was necessary that he should
explain to her the working of the system which made it impossible for
him, as a member of the Government, to entertain an opinion of his
own.
"And do you mean that you would lose your salary?" she asked.
"Certainly I should."
"Would not that be very dreadful?"
He laughed as he acknowledged that it would be dreadful. "It is very
dreadful, Mary, to have nothing to eat and drink. But what is a man
to do? Would you recommend me to say that black is white?"
"I am sure you will never do that."
"You see, Mary, it is very nice to be called by a big name and to
have a salary, and it is very comfortable to be envied by one's
friends and enemies;--but there are drawbacks. There is this especial
drawback." Then he paused for a moment before he went on.
"What especial drawback, Phineas?"
"A man cannot do what he pleases with himself. How can a man marry,
so circumstanced as I am?"
She hesitated for a moment, and then she answered him,--"A man may be
very happy without marrying, I suppose."
He also paused for many moments before he spoke again, and she then
made a faint attempt to escape from him. But before she succeeded he
had asked her a question which arrested her. "I wonder whether you
would listen to me if I were to tell you a history?" Of course she
listened, and the history he told her was the tale of his love for
Violet Effingham.
"And she has money of her own?" Mary asked.
"Yes;--she is rich. She has a large fortune."
"Then, Mr. Finn, you must seek some one else who is equally blessed."
"Mary, that is untrue,--that is ill-natured. You do not mean that.
Say that you do not mean it. You have not believed that I loved Miss
Effingham because she was rich."
"But you have told me that you could love no one who is not rich."
"I have said nothing of the kind. Love is involuntary. It does not
often run in a yoke with prudence. I have told you my history as
far as it is concerned with Violet Effingham. I did love her very
dearly."
"Did love her, Mr. Finn?"
"Yes;--did love her. Is there any inconstancy in ceasing to love when
one is not loved? Is there inconstancy in changing one's love, and in
loving again?"
"I do not know," said Mary, to whom the occasion was becoming so
embarrassing that she no longer was able to reply with words that had
a meaning in them.
"If there be, dear, I am inconstant." He paused, but of course she
had not a syllable to say. "I have changed my love. But I could not
speak of a new passion till I had told the story of that which has
passed away. You have heard it all now, Mary. Can you try to love me,
after that?" It had come at last,--the thing for which she had been
ever wishing. It had come in spite of her imprudence, and in spite of
her prudence. When she had heard him to the end she was not a whit
angry with him,--she was not in the least aggrieved,--because he had
been lost to her in his love for this Miss Effingham, while she had
been so nearly lost by her love for him. For women such episodes
in the lives of their lovers have an excitement which is almost
pleasurable, whereas each man is anxious to hear his lady swear that
until he appeared upon the scene her heart had been fancy free. Mary,
upon the whole, had liked the story,--had thought that it had been
finely told, and was well pleased with the final catastrophe. But,
nevertheless, she was not prepared with her reply. "Have you no
answer to give me, Mary?" he said, looking up into her eyes. I am
afraid that he did not doubt what would be her answer,--as it would
be good that all lovers should do. "You must vouchsafe me some word,
Mary."
When she essayed to speak she found that she was dumb. She could not
get her voice to give her the assistance of a single word. She did
not cry, but there was a motion as of sobbing in her throat which
impeded all utterance. She was as happy as earth,--as heaven could
make her; but she did not know how to tell him that she was happy.
And yet she longed to tell it, that he might know how thankful she
was to him for his goodness. He still sat looking at her, and now by
degrees he had got her hand in his. "Mary," he said, "will you be my
wife,--my own wife?"
When half an hour had passed, they were still together, and now she
had found the use of her tongue. "Do whatever you like best," she
said. "I do not care which you do. If you came to me to-morrow and
told me you had no income, it would make no difference. Though to
love you and to have your love is all the world to me,--though it
makes all the difference between misery and happiness,--I would
sooner give up that than be a clog on you." Then he took her in his
arms and kissed her. "Oh, Phineas!" she said, "I do love you so
entirely!"
"My own one!"
"Yes; your own one. But if you had known it always! Never mind. Now
you are my own,--are you not?"
"Indeed yes, dearest."
"Oh, what a thing it is to be victorious at last."
"What on earth are you two doing here these two hours together?" said
Barbara, bursting into the room.
"What are we doing?" said Phineas.
"Yes;--what are you doing?"
"Nothing in particular," said Mary.
"Nothing at all in particular," said Phineas. "Only this,--that we
have engaged ourselves to marry each other. It is quite a trifle,--is
it not, Mary?"
"Oh, Barbara!" said the joyful girl, springing forward into her
friend's arms; "I do believe I am the happiest creature on the face
of this earth!"
CHAPTER LXVII
Job's Comforters
Before Phineas had returned to London his engagement with Mary Flood
Jones was known to all his family, was known to Mrs. Flood Jones, and
was indeed known generally to all Killaloe. That other secret of his,
which had reference to the probability of his being obliged to throw
up his office, was known only to Mary herself. He thought that he had
done all that honour required of him in telling her of his position
before he had proposed;--so that she might on that ground refuse
him if she were so minded. And yet he had known very well that such
prudence on her part was not to be expected. If she loved him, of
course she would say so when she was asked. And he had known that
she loved him. "There may be delay, Mary," he said to her as he was
going; "nay, there must be delay, if I am obliged to resign."
"I do not care a straw for delay if you will be true to me," she
said.
"Do you doubt my truth, dearest?"
"Not in the least. I will swear by it as the one thing that is truest
in the world."
"You may, dearest. And if this should come to pass I must go to work
and put my shoulder to the wheel, and earn an income for you by my
old profession before I can make you my wife. With such a motive
before me I know that I shall earn an income." And thus they parted.
Mary, though of course she would have preferred that her future
husband should remain in his high office, that he should be a member
of Parliament and an Under-Secretary of State, admitted no doubt
into her mind to disturb her happiness; and Phineas, though he had
many misgivings as to the prudence of what he had done, was not the
less strong in his resolution of constancy and endurance. He would
throw up his position, resign his seat, and go to work at the Bar
instantly, if he found that his independence as a man required him to
do so. And, above all, let come what might, he would be true to Mary
Flood Jones.
December was half over before he saw Lord Cantrip. "Yes,--yes;" said
Lord Cantrip, when the Under-Secretary began to tell his story; "I
saw what you were about. I wish I had been at your elbow."
"If you knew the country as I know it, you would be as eager about it
as I am."
"Then I can only say that I am very glad that I do not know the
country as you know it. You see, Finn, it's my idea that if a man
wants to make himself useful he should stick to some special kind of
work. With you it's a thousand pities that you should not do so."
"You think, then, I ought to resign?"
"I don't say anything about that. As you wish it, of course I'll
speak to Gresham. Monk, I believe, has resigned already."
"He has written to me, and told me so," said Phineas.
"I always felt afraid of him for your sake, Finn. Mr. Monk is a
clever man, and as honest a man as any in the House, but I always
thought that he was a dangerous friend for you. However, we will see.
I will speak to Gresham after Christmas. There is no hurry about it."
When Parliament met the first great subject of interest was the
desertion of Mr. Monk from the Ministry. He at once took his place
below the gangway, sitting as it happened exactly in front of Mr.
Turnbull, and there he made his explanation. Some one opposite asked
a question whether a certain right honourable gentleman had not left
the Cabinet. Then Mr. Gresham replied that to his infinite regret his
right honourable friend, who lately presided at the Board of Trade,
had resigned; and he went on to explain that this resignation had,
according to his ideas, been quite unnecessary. His right honourable
friend entertained certain ideas about Irish tenant-right, as to
which he himself and his right honourable friend the Secretary for
Ireland could not exactly pledge themselves to be in unison with him;
but he had thought that the motion might have rested at any rate over
this session. Then Mr. Monk explained, making his first great speech
on Irish tenant-right. He found himself obliged to advocate some
immediate measure for giving security to the Irish farmer; and as he
could not do so as a member of the Cabinet, he was forced to resign
the honour of that position. He said something also as to the great
doubt which had ever weighed on his own mind as to the inexpediency
of a man at his time of life submitting himself for the first time
to the trammels of office. This called up Mr. Turnbull, who took
the opportunity of saying that he now agreed cordially with his old
friend for the first time since that old friend had listened to the
blandishments of the ministerial seducer, and that he welcomed his
old friend back to those independent benches with great satisfaction.
In this way the debate was very exciting. Nothing was said which made
it then necessary for Phineas to get upon his legs or to declare
himself; but he perceived that the time would rapidly come in which
he must do so. Mr. Gresham, though he strove to speak with gentle
words, was evidently very angry with the late President of the Board
of Trade; and, moreover, it was quite clear that a bill would be
introduced by Mr. Monk himself, which Mr. Gresham was determined
to oppose. If all this came to pass and there should be a close
division, Phineas felt that his fate would be sealed. When he again
spoke to Lord Cantrip on the subject, the Secretary of State shrugged
his shoulders and shook his head. "I can only advise you," said Lord
Cantrip, "to forget all that took place in Ireland. If you will do
so, nobody else will remember it." "As if it were possible to forget
such things," he said in the letter which he wrote to Mary that
night. "Of course I shall go now. If it were not for your sake, I
should not in the least regret it."
He had been with Madame Goesler frequently in the winter, and had
discussed with her so often the question of his official position
that she had declared that she was coming at last to understand the
mysteries of an English Cabinet. "I think you are quite right, my
friend," she said,--"quite right. What--you are to be in Parliament
and say that this black thing is white, or that this white thing is
black, because you like to take your salary! That cannot be honest!"
Then, when he came to talk to her of money,--that he must give up
Parliament itself, if he gave up his place,--she offered to lend him
money. "Why should you not treat me as a friend?" she said. When he
pointed out to her that there would never come a time in which he
could pay such money back, she stamped her foot and told him that
he had better leave her. "You have high principle," she said, "but
not principle sufficiently high to understand that this thing could
be done between you and me without disgrace to either of us." Then
Phineas assured her with tears in his eyes that such an arrangement
was impossible without disgrace to him.
But he whispered to this new friend no word of the engagement with
his dear Irish Mary. His Irish life, he would tell himself, was a
thing quite apart and separate from his life in England. He said not
a word about Mary Flood Jones to any of those with whom he lived
in London. Why should he, feeling as he did that it would so soon
be necessary that he should disappear from among them? About Miss
Effingham he had said much to Madame Goesler. She had asked him
whether he had abandoned all hope. "That affair, then, is over?" she
had said.
"Yes;--it is all over now."
"And she will marry the red-headed, violent lord?"
"Heaven knows. I think she will. But she is exactly the girl to
remain unmarried if she takes it into her head that the man she likes
is in any way unfitted for her."
"Does she love this lord?"
"Oh yes;--there is no doubt of that." And Phineas, as he made this
acknowledgment, seemed to do so without much inward agony of soul.
When he had been last in London he could not speak of Violet and Lord
Chiltern together without showing that his misery was almost too much
for him.
At this time he received some counsel from two friends. One was
Laurence Fitzgibbon, and the other was Barrington Erle. Laurence had
always been true to him after a fashion, and had never resented his
intrusion at the Colonial Office. "Phineas, me boy," he said, "if all
this is thrue, you're about up a tree."
"It is true that I shall support Monk's motion."
"Then, me boy, you're up a tree as far as office goes. A place like
that niver suited me, because, you see, that poker of a young lord
expected so much of a man; but you don't mind that kind of thing, and
I thought you were as snug as snug."
"Troubles will come, you see, Laurence."
"Bedad, yes. It's all throubles, I think, sometimes. But you've a way
out of all your throubles."
"What way?"
"Pop the question to Madame Max. The money's all thrue, you know."
"I don't doubt the money in the least," said Phineas.
"And it's my belief she'll take you without a second word. Anyways,
thry it, Phinny, my boy. That's my advice." Phineas so far agreed
with his friend Laurence that he thought it possible that Madame
Goesler might accept him were he to propose marriage to her. He knew,
of course, that that mode of escape from his difficulties was out
of the question for him, but he could not explain this to Laurence
Fitzgibbon.
"I am sorry to hear that you have taken up a bad cause," said
Barrington Erle to him.
"It is a pity;--is it not?"
"And the worst of it is that you'll sacrifice yourself and do no good
to the cause. I never knew a man break away in this fashion, and not
feel afterwards that he had done it all for nothing."
"But what is a man to do, Barrington? He can't smother his
convictions."
"Convictions! There is nothing on earth that I'm so much afraid of in
a young member of Parliament as convictions. There are ever so many
rocks against which men get broken. One man can't keep his temper.
Another can't hold his tongue. A third can't say a word unless he has
been priming himself half a session. A fourth is always thinking of
himself, and wanting more than he can get. A fifth is idle, and won't
be there when he's wanted. A sixth is always in the way. A seventh
lies so that you never can trust him. I've had to do with them all,
but a fellow with convictions is the worst of all."
"I don't see how a fellow is to help himself," said Phineas. "When a
fellow begins to meddle with politics they will come."
"Why can't you grow into them gradually as your betters and elders
have done before you? It ought to be enough for any man, when he
begins, to know that he's a Liberal. He understands which side of the
House he's to vote, and who is to lead him. What's the meaning of
having a leader to a party, if it's not that? Do you think that you
and Mr. Monk can go and make a government between you?"
"Whatever I think, I'm sure he doesn't."
"I'm not so sure of that. But look here, Phineas, I don't care two
straws about Monk's going. I always thought that Mildmay and the
Duke were wrong when they asked him to join. I knew he'd go over the
traces,--unless, indeed, he took his money and did nothing for it,
which is the way with some of those Radicals. I look upon him as
gone."
"He has gone."
"The devil go along with him, as you say in Ireland. But don't you be
such a fool as to ruin yourself for a crotchet of Monk's. It isn't
too late yet for you to hold back. To tell you the truth, Gresham
has said a word to me about it already. He is most anxious that you
should stay, but of course you can't stay and vote against us."
"Of course I cannot."
"I look upon you, you know, as in some sort my own child. I've tried
to bring other fellows forward who seemed to have something in them,
but I have never succeeded as I have with you. You've hit the thing
off, and have got the ball at your foot. Upon my honour, in the whole
course of my experience I have never known such good fortune as
yours."
"And I shall always remember how it began, Barrington," said Phineas,
who was greatly moved by the energy and solicitude of his friend.
"But, for God's sake, don't go and destroy it all by such mad
perversity as this. They mean to do something next session. Morrison
is going to take it up." Sir Walter Morrison was at this time
Secretary for Ireland. "But of course we can't let a fellow like Monk
take the matter into his own hands just when he pleases. I call it
d----d treachery."
"Monk is no traitor, Barrington."
"Men will have their own opinions about that. It's generally
understood that when a man is asked to take a seat in the Cabinet he
is expected to conform with his colleagues, unless something very
special turns up. But I am speaking of you now, and not of Monk. You
are not a man of fortune. You cannot afford to make ducks and drakes.
You are excellently placed, and you have plenty of time to hark back,
if you'll only listen to reason. All that Irish stump balderdash will
never be thrown in your teeth by us, if you will just go on as though
it had never been uttered."
Phineas could only thank his friend for his advice, which was at
least disinterested, and was good of its kind, and tell him that he
would think of it. He did think of it very much. He almost thought
that, were it to do again, he would allow Mr. Monk to go upon his
tour alone, and keep himself from the utterance of anything that so
good a judge as Erle could call stump balderdash. As he sat in his
arm-chair in his room at the Colonial Office, with despatch-boxes
around him, and official papers spread before him,--feeling himself
to be one of those who in truth managed and governed the affairs of
this great nation, feeling also that if he relinquished his post now
he could never regain it,--he did wish that he had been a little less
in love with independence, a little quieter in his boastings that no
official considerations should ever silence his tongue. But all this
was too late now. He knew that his skin was not thick enough to bear
the arrows of those archers who would bend their bows against him if
he should now dare to vote against Mr. Monk's motion. His own party
might be willing to forgive and forget; but there would be others who
would read those reports, and would appear in the House with the
odious tell-tale newspapers in their hands.
Then he received a letter from his father. Some good-natured person
had enlightened the doctor as to the danger in which his son
was placing himself. Dr. Finn, who in his own profession was a
very excellent and well-instructed man, had been so ignorant of
Parliamentary tactics, as to have been proud at his son's success at
the Irish meetings. He had thought that Phineas was carrying on his
trade as a public speaker with proper energy and continued success.
He had cared nothing himself for tenant-right, and had acknowledged
to Mr. Monk that he could not understand in what it was that the
farmers were wronged. But he knew that Mr. Monk was a Cabinet
Minister, and he thought that Phineas was earning his salary. Then
there came some one who undeceived him, and the paternal bosom of
the doctor was dismayed. "I don't mean to interfere," he said in his
letter, "but I can hardly believe that you really intend to resign
your place. Yet I am told that you must do so if you go on with this
matter. My dear boy, pray think about it. I cannot imagine you are
disposed to lose all that you have won for nothing." Mary also wrote
to him. Mrs. Finn had been talking to her, and Mary had taught
herself to believe that after the many sweet conversations she
had had with a man so high in office as Phineas, she really did
understand something about the British Government. Mrs. Finn had
interrogated Mary, and Mary had been obliged to own that it was quite
possible that Phineas would be called upon to resign.
"But why, my dear? Heaven and earth! Resign two thousand a year!"
"That he may maintain his independence," said Mary proudly.
"Fiddlestick!" said Mrs. Finn. "How is he to maintain you, or himself
either, if he goes on in that way? I shouldn't wonder if he didn't
get himself all wrong, even now." Then Mrs. Finn began to cry; and
Mary could only write to her lover, pointing out to him how very
anxious all his friends were that he should do nothing in a hurry.
But what if the thing were done already! Phineas in his great
discomfort went to seek further counsel from Madame Goesler. Of all
his counsellors, Madame Goesler was the only one who applauded him
for what he was about to do.
"But, after all, what is it you give up? Mr. Gresham may be out
to-morrow, and then where will be your place?"
"There does not seem to be much chance of that at present."
"Who can tell? Of course I do not understand,--but it was only the
other day when Mr. Mildmay was there, and only the day before that
when Lord de Terrier was there, and again only the day before
that when Lord Brock was there." Phineas endeavoured to make her
understand that of the four Prime Ministers whom she had named, three
were men of the same party as himself, under whom it would have
suited him to serve. "I would not serve under any man if I were an
English gentleman in Parliament," said Madame Goesler.
"What is a poor fellow to do?" said Phineas, laughing.
"A poor fellow need not be a poor fellow unless he likes," said
Madame Goesler. Immediately after this Phineas left her, and as he
went along the street he began to question himself whether the
prospects of his own darling Mary were at all endangered by his
visits to Park Lane; and to reflect what sort of a blackguard he
would be,--a blackguard of how deep a dye,--were he to desert Mary
and marry Madame Max Goesler. Then he also asked himself as to the
nature and quality of his own political honesty if he were to abandon
Mary in order that he might maintain his parliamentary independence.
After all, if it should ever come to pass that his biography should
be written, his biographer would say very much more about the manner
in which he kept his seat in Parliament than of the manner in which
he kept his engagement with Miss Mary Flood Jones. Half a dozen
people who knew him and her might think ill of him for his conduct
to Mary, but the world would not condemn him! And when he thundered
forth his liberal eloquence from below the gangway as an independent
member, having the fortune of his charming wife to back him, giving
excellent dinners at the same time in Park Lane, would not the world
praise him very loudly?
When he got to his office he found a note from Lord Brentford
inviting him to dine in Portman Square.
CHAPTER LXVIII
The Joint Attack
The note from Lord Brentford surprised our hero not a little. He had
had no communication with the Earl since the day on which he had been
so savagely scolded about the duel, when the Earl had plainly told
him that his conduct had been as bad as it could be. Phineas had not
on that account become at all ashamed of his conduct in reference to
the duel, but he had conceived that any reconciliation between him
and the Earl had been out of the question. Now there had come a
civilly-worded invitation, asking him to dine with the offended
nobleman. The note had been written by Lady Laura, but it had
purported to come from Lord Brentford himself. He sent back word to
say that he should be happy to have the honour of dining with Lord
Brentford.
Parliament at this time had been sitting nearly a month, and it was
already March. Phineas had heard nothing of Lady Laura, and did not
even know that she was in London till he saw her handwriting. He did
not know that she had not gone back to her husband, and that she had
remained with her father all the winter at Saulsby. He had also
heard that Lord Chiltern had been at Saulsby. All the world had been
talking of the separation of Mr. Kennedy from his wife, one half of
the world declaring that his wife, if not absolutely false to him,
had neglected all her duties; and the other half asserting that Mr.
Kennedy's treatment of his wife had been so bad that no woman could
possibly have lived with him. There had even been a rumour that Lady
Laura had gone off with a lover from the Duke of Omnium's garden
party, and some indiscreet tongue had hinted that a certain unmarried
Under-Secretary of State was missing at the same time. But Lord
Chiltern upon this had shown his teeth with so strong a propensity to
do some real biting, that no one had ventured to repeat that rumour.
Its untruth was soon established by the fact that Lady Laura Kennedy
was living with her father at Saulsby. Of Mr. Kennedy, Phineas had as
yet seen nothing since he had been up in town. That gentleman, though
a member of the Cabinet, had not been in London at the opening of the
session, nor had he attended the Cabinet meetings during the recess.
It had been stated in the newspapers that he was ill, and stated in
private that he could not bear to show himself since his wife had
left him. At last, however, he came to London, and Phineas saw him in
the House. Then, when the first meeting of the Cabinet was summoned
after his return, it became known that he also had resigned his
office. There was nothing said about his resignation in the House. He
had resigned on the score of ill-health, and that very worthy peer,
Lord Mount Thistle, formerly Sir Marmaduke Morecombe, came back to
the Duchy of Lancaster in his place. A Prime Minister sometimes finds
great relief in the possession of a serviceable stick who can be made
to go in and out as occasion may require; only it generally happens
that the stick will expect some reward when he is made to go out.
Lord Mount Thistle immediately saw his way to a viscount's coronet,
when he was once more summoned to the august councils of the
Ministers.
A few days after this had been arranged, in the interval between
Lord Brentford's invitation and Lord Brentford's dinner, Phineas
encountered Mr. Kennedy so closely in one of the passages of the
House that it was impossible that they should not speak to each
other, unless they were to avoid each other as people do who have
palpably quarrelled. Phineas saw that Mr. Kennedy was hesitating, and
therefore took the bull by the horns. He greeted his former friend
in a friendly fashion, shaking him by the hand, and then prepared
to pass on. But Mr. Kennedy, though he had hesitated at first, now
detained his brother member. "Finn," he said, "if you are not engaged
I should like to speak to you for a moment." Phineas was not engaged,
and allowed himself to be led out arm-in-arm by the late Chancellor
of the Duchy into Westminster Hall. "Of course you know what a
terrible thing has happened to me," said Mr. Kennedy.
"Yes;--I have heard of it," said Phineas.
"Everybody has heard of it. That is one of the terrible cruelties of
such a blow."
"All those things are very bad of course. I was very much
grieved,--because you have both been intimate friends of mine."
"Yes,--yes; we were. Do you ever see her now?"
"Not since last July,--at the Duke's party, you know."
"Ah, yes; the morning of that day was the last on which I spoke to
her. It was then she left me."
"I am going to dine with Lord Brentford to-morrow, and I dare say she
will be there."
"Yes;--she is in town. I saw her yesterday in her father's carriage.
I think that she had no cause to leave me."
"Of course I cannot say anything about that."
"I think she had no cause to leave me." Phineas as he heard this
could not but remember all that Lady Laura had told himself, and
thought that no woman had ever had a better reason for leaving her
husband. "There were things I did not like, and I said so."
"I suppose that is generally the way," replied Phineas.
"But surely a wife should listen to a word of caution from her
husband."
"I fancy they never like it," said Phineas.
"But are we all of us to have all that we like? I have not found it
so. Or would it be good for us if we had?" Then he paused; but as
Phineas had no further remark to make, he continued speaking after
they had walked about a third of the length of the hall. "It is not
of my own comfort I am thinking now so much as of her name and her
future conduct. Of course it will in every sense be best for her that
she should come back to her husband's roof."
"Well; yes;--perhaps it would," said Phineas.
"Has she not accepted that lot for better or for worse?" said Mr.
Kennedy, solemnly.
"But incompatibility of temper, you know, is always,--always
supposed--. You understand me?"
"It is my intention that she should come back to me. I do not wish to
make any legal demand;--at any rate, not as yet. Will you consent to
be the bearer of a message from me both to herself and to the Earl?"
Now it seemed to Phineas that of all the messengers whom Mr. Kennedy
could have chosen he was the most unsuited to be a Mercury in this
cause,--not perceiving that he had been so selected with some craft,
in order that Lady Laura might understand that the accusation against
her was, at any rate, withdrawn, which had named Phineas as her
lover. He paused again before he answered. "Of course," he said, "I
should be most willing to be of service, if it were possible. But I
do not see how I can speak to the Earl about it. Though I am going to
dine with him I don't know why he has asked me;--for he and I are on
very bad terms. He heard that stupid story about the duel, and has
not spoken to me since."
"I heard that, too," said Mr. Kennedy, frowning blackly as he
remembered his wife's duplicity.
"Everybody heard of it. But it has made such a difference between him
and me, that I don't think I can meddle. Send for Lord Chiltern, and
speak to him."
"Speak to Chiltern! Never! He would probably strike me on the head
with his club."
"Call on the Earl yourself."
"I did, and he would not see me."
"Write to him."
"I did, and he sent back my letter unopened."
"Write to her."
"I did;--and she answered me, saying only thus; 'Indeed, indeed, it
cannot be so.' But it must be so. The laws of God require it, and the
laws of man permit it. I want some one to point out that to them more
softly than I could do if I were simply to write to that effect. To
the Earl, of course, I cannot write again." The conference ended by a
promise from Phineas that he would, if possible, say a word to Lady
Laura.
When he was shown into Lord Brentford's drawing-room he found not
only Lady Laura there, but her brother. Lord Brentford was not in
the room. Barrington Erle was there, and so also were Lord and Lady
Cantrip.
"Is not your father going to be here?" he said to Lady Laura, after
their first greeting.
"We live in that hope," said she, "and do not at all know why he
should be late. What has become of him, Oswald?"
"He came in with me half an hour ago, and I suppose he does not
dress as quickly as I do," said Lord Chiltern; upon which Phineas
immediately understood that the father and the son were reconciled,
and he rushed to the conclusion that Violet and her lover would also
soon be reconciled, if such were not already the case. He felt some
remnant of a soreness that it should be so, as a man feels where
his headache has been when the real ache itself has left him. Then
the host came in and made his apologies. "Chiltern kept me standing
about," he said, "till the east wind had chilled me through and
through. The only charm I recognise in youth is that it is impervious
to the east wind." Phineas felt quite sure now that Violet and her
lover were reconciled, and he had a distinct feeling of the place
where the ache had been. Dear Violet! But, after all, Violet lacked
that sweet, clinging, feminine softness which made Mary Flood Jones
so pre-eminently the most charming of her sex. The Earl, when he had
repeated his general apology, especially to Lady Cantrip, who was the
only lady present except his daughter, came up to our hero and shook
him kindly by the hand. He took him up to one of the windows and then
addressed him in a voice of mock solemnity.
"Stick to the colonies, young man," he said, "and never meddle with
foreign affairs;--especially not at Blankenberg."
"Never again, my Lord;--never again."
"And leave all questions of fire-arms to be arranged between the
Horse Guards and the War Office. I have heard a good deal about it
since I saw you, and I retract a part of what I said. But a duel is a
foolish thing,--a very foolish thing. Come;--here is dinner." And the
Earl walked off with Lady Cantrip, and Lord Cantrip walked off with
Lady Laura. Barrington Erle followed, and Phineas had an opportunity
of saying a word to his friend, Lord Chiltern, as they went down
together.
"It's all right between you and your father?"
"Yes;--after a fashion. There is no knowing how long it will last. He
wants me to do three things, and I won't do any one of them."
"What are the three?"
"To go into Parliament, to be an owner of sheep and oxen, and to hunt
in his own county. I should never attend the first, I should ruin
myself with the second, and I should never get a run in the third."
But there was not a word said about his marriage.
There were only seven who sat down to dinner, and the six were all
people with whom Phineas was or had been on most intimate terms.
Lord Cantrip was his official chief, and, since that connection had
existed between them, Lady Cantrip had been very gracious to him.
She quite understood the comfort which it was to her husband to have
under him, as his representative in the House of Commons, a man whom
he could thoroughly trust and like, and therefore she had used her
woman's arts to bind Phineas to her lord in more than mere official
bondage. She had tried her skill also upon Laurence Fitzgibbon,--but
altogether in vain. He had eaten her dinners and accepted her
courtesies, and had given for them no return whatever. But Phineas
had possessed a more grateful mind, and had done all that had been
required of him;--had done all that had been required of him till
there had come that terrible absurdity in Ireland. "I knew very well
what sort of things would happen when they brought such a man as Mr.
Monk into the Cabinet," Lady Cantrip had said to her husband.
But though the party was very small, and though the guests were all
his intimate friends, Phineas suspected nothing special till an
attack was made upon him as soon as the servants had left the room.
This was done in the presence of the two ladies, and, no doubt, had
been preconcerted. There was Lord Cantrip there, who had already said
much to him, and Barrington Erle who had said more even than Lord
Cantrip. Lord Brentford, himself a member of the Cabinet, opened the
attack by asking whether it was actually true that Mr. Monk meant
to go on with his motion. Barrington Erle asserted that Mr. Monk
positively would do so. "And Gresham will oppose it?" asked the Earl.
"Of course he will," said Barrington. "Of course he will," said Lord
Cantrip. "I know what I should think of him if he did not," said Lady
Cantrip. "He is the last man in the world to be forced into a thing,"
said Lady Laura. Then Phineas knew pretty well what was coming on
him.
Lord Brentford began again by asking how many supporters Mr. Monk
would have in the House. "That depends upon the amount of courage
which the Conservatives may have," said Barrington Erle. "If they
dare to vote for a thoroughly democratic measure, simply for the sake
of turning us out, it is quite on the cards that they may succeed."
"But of our own people?" asked Lord Cantrip. "You had better inquire
that of Phineas Finn," said Barrington. And then the attack was made.
Our hero had a bad half hour of it, though many words were said which
must have gratified him much. They all wanted to keep him,--so Lord
Cantrip declared, "except one or two whom I could name, and who are
particularly anxious to wear his shoes," said Barrington, thinking
that certain reminiscences of Phineas with regard to Mr. Bonteen
and others might operate as strongly as any other consideration to
make him love his place. Lord Brentford declared that he could not
understand it,--that he should find himself lost in amazement if such
a man as his young friend allowed himself to be led into the outer
wilderness by such an ignis-fatuus of light as this. Lord Cantrip
laid down the unwritten traditional law of Government officials very
plainly. A man in office,--in an office which really imposed upon
him as much work as he could possibly do with credit to himself or
his cause,--was dispensed from the necessity of a conscience with
reference to other matters. It was for Sir Walter Morrison to have
a conscience about Irish tenant-right, as no doubt he had,--just as
Phineas Finn had a conscience about Canada, and Jamaica, and the
Cape. Barrington Erle was very strong about parties in general, and
painted the comforts of official position in glowing colours. But I
think that the two ladies were more efficacious than even their male
relatives in the arguments which they used. "We have been so happy
to have you among us," said Lady Cantrip, looking at him with
beseeching, almost loving eyes. "Mr. Finn knows," said Lady Laura,
"that since he first came into Parliament I have always believed
in his success, and I have been very proud to see it." "We shall
weep over him, as over a fallen angel, if he leaves us," said Lady
Cantrip. "I won't say that I will weep," said Lady Laura, "but I do
not know anything of the kind that would so truly make me unhappy."
What was he to say in answer to applications so flattering and so
pressing? He would have said nothing, had that been possible, but he
felt himself obliged to reply. He replied very weakly,--of course,
not justifying himself, but declaring that as he had gone so far he
must go further. He must vote for the measure now. Both his chief and
Barrington Erle proved, or attempted to prove, that he was wrong in
this. Of course he would not speak on the measure, and his vote for
his party would probably be allowed to pass without notice. One or
two newspapers might perhaps attack him; but what public man cared
for such attacks as those? His whole party would hang by him, and in
that he would find ample consolation. Phineas could only say that he
would think of it;--and this he said in so irresolute a tone of voice
that all the men then present believed that he was gained. The two
ladies, however, were of a different opinion. "In spite of anything
that anybody may say, he will do what he thinks right when the time
comes," said Laura to her father afterwards. But then Lady Laura had
been in love with him,--was perhaps almost in love with him still.
"I'm afraid he is a mule," said Lady Cantrip to her husband. "He's
a good mule up a hill with a load on his back," said his lordship.
"But with a mule there always comes a time when you can't manage
him," said Lady Cantrip. But Lady Cantrip had never been in love with
Phineas.
Phineas found a moment, before he left Lord Brentford's house, to say
a word to Lady Laura as to the commission that had been given to him.
"It can never be," said Lady Laura, shuddering;--"never, never,
never!"
"You are not angry with me for speaking?"
"Oh, no--not if he told you."
"He made me promise that I would."
"Tell him it cannot be. Tell him that if he has any instruction to
send me as to what he considers to be my duty, I will endeavour to
comply, if that duty can be done apart. I will recognize him so
far, because of my vow. But not even for the sake of my vow, will I
endeavour to live with him. His presence would kill me!"
When Phineas repeated this, or as much of this as he judged to be
necessary, to Mr. Kennedy a day or two afterwards, that gentleman
replied that in such case he would have no alternative but to seek
redress at law. "I have done nothing to my wife," said he, "of
which I need be ashamed. It will be sad, no doubt, to have all our
affairs bandied about in court, and made the subject of comment in
newspapers, but a man must go through that, or worse than that, in
the vindication of his rights, and for the performance of his duty to
his Maker." That very day Mr. Kennedy went to his lawyer, and desired
that steps might be taken for the restitution to him of his conjugal
rights.
CHAPTER LXIX
The Temptress
Mr. Monk's bill was read the first time before Easter, and Phineas
Finn still held his office. He had spoken to the Prime Minister
once on the subject, and had been surprised at that gentleman's
courtesy;--for Mr. Gresham had the reputation of being unconciliatory
in his manners, and very prone to resent anything like desertion from
that allegiance which was due to himself as the leader of his party.
"You had better stay where you are and take no step that may be
irretrievable, till you have quite made up your mind," said Mr.
Gresham.
"I fear I have made up my mind," said Phineas.
"Nothing can be done till after Easter," replied the great man, "and
there is no knowing how things may go then. I strongly recommend you
to stay with us. If you can do this it will be only necessary that
you shall put your resignation in Lord Cantrip's hands before you
speak or vote against us. See Monk and talk it over with him." Mr.
Gresham possibly imagined that Mr. Monk might be moved to abandon his
bill, when he saw what injury he was about to do.
At this time Phineas received the following letter from his darling
Mary:--
Floodborough, Thursday.
DEAREST PHINEAS,
We have just got home from Killaloe, and mean to remain
here all through the summer. After leaving your sisters
this house seems so desolate; but I shall have the more
time to think of you. I have been reading Tennyson, as you
told me, and I fancy that I could in truth be a Mariana
here, if it were not that I am so quite certain that you
will come;--and that makes all the difference in the world
in a moated grange. Last night I sat at the window and
tried to realise what I should feel if you were to tell me
that you did not want me; and I got myself into such an
ecstatic state of mock melancholy that I cried for half an
hour. But when one has such a real living joy at the back
of one's romantic melancholy, tears are very pleasant;--
they water and do not burn.
I must tell you about them all at Killaloe. They certainly
are very unhappy at the idea of your resigning. Your
father says very little, but I made him own that to act
as you are acting for the sake of principle is very grand.
I would not leave him till he had said so, and he did say
it. Dear Mrs. Finn does not understand it as well, but
she will do so. She complains mostly for my sake, and
when I tell her that I will wait twenty years if it is
necessary, she tells me I do not know what waiting means.
But I will,--and will be happy, and will never really
think myself a Mariana. Dear, dear, dear Phineas, indeed
I won't. The girls are half sad and half proud. But I am
wholly proud, and know that you are doing just what you
ought to do. I shall think more of you as a man who might
have been a Prime Minister than if you were really sitting
in the Cabinet like Lord Cantrip. As for mamma, I cannot
make her quite understand it. She merely says that no
young man who is going to be married ought to resign
anything. Dear mamma;--sometimes she does say such odd
things.
You told me to tell you everything, and so I have. I
talk to some of the people here, and tell them what they
might do if they had tenant-right. One old fellow, Mike
Dufferty,--I don't know whether you remember him,--asked
if he would have to pay the rent all the same. When I said
certainly he would, then he shook his head. But as you
said once, when we want to do good to people one has no
right to expect that they should understand it. It is like
baptizing little infants.
I got both your notes;--seven words in one, Mr.
Under-Secretary, and nine in the other! But the one little
word at the end was worth a whole sheet full of common
words. How nice it is to write letters without paying
postage, and to send them about the world with a grand
name in the corner. When Barney brings me one he always
looks as if he didn't know whether it was a love letter
or an order to go to Botany Bay. If he saw the inside of
them, how short they are, I don't think he'd think much of
you as a lover nor yet as an Under-Secretary.
But I think ever so much of you as both;--I do, indeed;
and I am not scolding you a bit. As long as I can have two
or three dear, sweet, loving words, I shall be as happy as
a queen. Ah, if you knew it all! But you never can know
it all. A man has so many other things to learn that he
cannot understand it.
Good-bye, dear, dear, dearest man. Whatever you do I shall
be quite sure you have done the best.
Ever your own, with all the love of her heart,
MARY F. JONES.
This was very nice. Such a man as was Phineas Finn always takes a
delight which he cannot express even to himself in the receipt of
such a letter as this. There is nothing so flattering as the warm
expression of the confidence of a woman's love, and Phineas thought
that no woman ever expressed this more completely than did his Mary.
Dear, dearest Mary. As for giving her up, as for treachery to one so
trusting, so sweet, so well beloved, that was out of the question.
But nevertheless the truth came home to him more clearly day by day,
that he of all men was the last who ought to have given himself up to
such a passion. For her sake he ought to have abstained. So he told
himself now. For her sake he ought to have kept aloof from her;--and
for his own sake he ought to have kept aloof from Mr. Monk. That very
day, with Mary's letter in his pocket, he went to the livery stables
and explained that he would not keep his horse any longer. There was
no difficulty about the horse. Mr. Howard Macleod of the Treasury
would take him from that very hour. Phineas, as he walked away,
uttered a curse upon Mr. Howard Macleod. Mr. Howard Macleod was just
beginning the glory of his life in London, and he, Phineas Finn, was
bringing his to an end.
With Mary's letter in his pocket he went up to Portman Square. He had
again got into the habit of seeing Lady Laura frequently, and was
often with her brother, who now again lived at his father's house.
A letter had reached Lord Brentford, through his lawyer, in which a
demand was made by Mr. Kennedy for the return of his wife. She was
quite determined that she would never go back to him; and there had
come to her a doubt whether it would not be expedient that she should
live abroad so as to be out of the way of persecution from her
husband. Lord Brentford was in great wrath, and Lord Chiltern had
once or twice hinted that perhaps he had better "see" Mr. Kennedy.
The amenities of such an interview, as this would be, had up to the
present day been postponed; and, in a certain way, Phineas had been
used as a messenger between Mr. Kennedy and his wife's family.
"I think it will end," she said, "in my going to Dresden, and
settling myself there. Papa will come to me when Parliament is not
sitting."
"It will be very dull."
"Dull! What does dulness amount to when one has come to such a pass
as this? When one is in the ruck of fortune, to be dull is very bad;
but when misfortune comes, simple dulness is nothing. It sounds
almost like relief."
"It is so hard that you should be driven away." She did not answer
him for a while, and he was beginning to think of his own case also.
Was it not hard that he too should be driven away? "It is odd enough
that we should both be going at the same time."
"But you will not go?"
"I think I shall. I have resolved upon this,--that if I give up my
place, I will give up my seat too. I went into Parliament with the
hope of office, and how can I remain there when I shall have gained
it and then have lost it?"
"But you will stay in London, Mr. Finn?"
"I think not. After all that has come and gone I should not be happy
here, and I should make my way easier and on cheaper terms in Dublin.
My present idea is that I shall endeavour to make a practice over in
my own country. It will be hard work beginning at the bottom;--will
it not?"
"And so unnecessary."
"Ah, Lady Laura,--if it only could be avoided! But it is of no use
going through all that again."
"How much we would both of us avoid if we could only have another
chance!" said Lady Laura. "If I could only be as I was before I
persuaded myself to marry a man whom I never loved, what a paradise
the earth would be to me! With me all regrets are too late."
"And with me as much so."
"No, Mr. Finn. Even should you resign your office, there is no reason
why you should give up your seat."
"Simply that I have no income to maintain me in London."
She was silent for a few moments, during which she changed her seat
so as to come nearer to him, placing herself on a corner of a sofa
close to the chair on which he was seated. "I wonder whether I may
speak to you plainly," she said.
"Indeed you may."
"On any subject?"
"Yes;--on any subject."
"I trust you have been able to rid your bosom of all remembrances of
Violet Effingham."
"Certainly not of all remembrances, Lady Laura."
"Of all hope, then?"
"I have no such hope."
"And of all lingering desires?"
"Well, yes;--and of all lingering desires. I know now that it cannot
be. Your brother is welcome to her."
"Ah;--of that I know nothing. He, with his perversity, has estranged
her. But I am sure of this,--that if she do not marry him, she will
marry no one. But it is not on account of him that I speak. He must
fight his own battles now."
"I shall not interfere with him, Lady Laura."
"Then why should you not establish yourself by a marriage that will
make place a matter of indifference to you? I know that it is within
your power to do so." Phineas put his hand up to his breastcoat
pocket, and felt that Mary's letter,--her precious letter,--was there
safe. It certainly was not in his power to do this thing which Lady
Laura recommended to him, but he hardly thought that the present was
a moment suitable for explaining to her the nature of the impediment
which stood in the way of such an arrangement. He had so lately
spoken to Lady Laura with an assurance of undying constancy of his
love for Miss Effingham, that he could not as yet acknowledge the
force of another passion. He shook his head by way of reply. "I tell
you that it is so," she said with energy.
"I am afraid not."
"Go to Madame Goesler, and ask her. Hear what she will say."
"Madame Goesler would laugh at me, no doubt."
"Psha! You do not think so. You know that she would not laugh. And
are you the man to be afraid of a woman's laughter? I think not."
Again he did not answer her at once, and when he did speak the tone
of his voice was altered. "What was it you said of yourself, just
now?"
"What did I say of myself?"
"You regretted that you had consented to marry a man,--whom you did
not love."
"Why should you not love her? And it is so different with a man! A
woman is wretched if she does not love her husband, but I fancy that
a man gets on very well without any such feeling. She cannot domineer
over you. She cannot expect you to pluck yourself out of your own
soil, and begin a new growth altogether in accordance with the laws
of her own. It was that which Mr. Kennedy did."
"I do not for a moment think that she would take me, if I were to
offer myself."
"Try her," said Lady Laura energetically. "Such trials cost you but
little;--we both of us know that!" Still he said nothing of the
letter in his pocket. "It is everything that you should go on now
that you have once begun. I do not believe in you working at the
Bar. You cannot do it. A man who has commenced life as you have done
with the excitement of politics, who has known what it is to take a
prominent part in the control of public affairs, cannot give it up
and be happy at other work. Make her your wife, and you may resign
or remain in office just as you choose. Office will be much easier
to you than it is now, because it will not be a necessity. Let me
at any rate have the pleasure of thinking that one of us can remain
here,--that we need not both fall together."
Still he did not tell her of the letter in his pocket. He felt that
she moved him,--that she made him acknowledge to himself how great
would be the pity of such a failure as would be his. He was quite as
much alive as she could be to the fact that work at the Bar, either
in London or in Dublin, would have no charms for him now. The
prospect of such a life was very dreary to him. Even with the comfort
of Mary's love such a life would be very dreary to him. And then he
knew,--he thought that he knew,--that were he to offer himself to
Madame Goesler he would not in truth be rejected. She had told him
that if poverty was a trouble to him he need be no longer poor. Of
course he had understood this. Her money was at his service if he
should choose to stoop and pick it up. And it was not only money that
such a marriage would give him. He had acknowledged to himself more
than once that Madame Goesler was very lovely, that she was clever,
attractive in every way, and as far as he could see, blessed with a
sweet temper. She had a position, too, in the world that would help
him rather than mar him. What might he not do with an independent
seat in the House of Commons, and as joint owner of the little house
in Park Lane? Of all careers which the world could offer to a man the
pleasantest would then be within his reach. "You appear to me as a
tempter," he said at last to Lady Laura.
"It is unkind of you to say that, and ungrateful. I would do anything
on earth in my power to help you."
"Nevertheless you are a tempter."
"I know how it ought to have been," she said, in a low voice. "I know
very well how it ought to have been. I should have kept myself free
till that time when we met on the braes of Loughlinter, and then all
would have been well with us."
"I do not know how that might have been," said Phineas, hoarsely.
"You do not know! But I know. Of course you have stabbed me with a
thousand daggers when you have told me from time to time of your love
for Violet. You have been very cruel,--needlessly cruel. Men are so
cruel! But for all that I have known that I could have kept you,--had
it not been too late when you spoke to me. Will you not own as much
as that?"
"Of course you would have been everything to me. I should never have
thought of Violet then."
"That is the only kind word you have said to me from that day to
this. I try to comfort myself in thinking that it would have been so.
But all that is past and gone, and done. I have had my romance and
you have had yours. As you are a man, it is natural that you should
have been disturbed by a double image;--it is not so with me."
"And yet you can advise me to offer marriage to a woman,--a woman
whom I am to seek merely because she is rich?"
"Yes;--I do so advise you. You have had your romance and must now
put up with reality. Why should I so advise you but for the interest
that I have in you? Your prosperity will do me no good. I shall not
even be here to see it. I shall hear of it only as so many a woman
banished out of England hears a distant misunderstood report of what
is going on in the country she has left. But I still have regard
enough,--I will be bold, and, knowing that you will not take it
amiss, will say love enough for you,--to feel a desire that you
should not be shipwrecked. Since we first took you in hand between
us, Barrington and I, I have never swerved in my anxiety on your
behalf. When I resolved that it would be better for us both that we
should be only friends, I did not swerve. When you would talk to me
so cruelly of your love for Violet, I did not swerve. When I warned
you from Loughlinter because I thought there was danger, I did not
swerve. When I bade you not to come to me in London because of my
husband, I did not swerve. When my father was hard upon you, I
did not swerve then. I would not leave him till he was softened.
When you tried to rob Oswald of his love, and I thought you would
succeed,--for I did think so,--I did not swerve. I have ever been
true to you. And now that I must hide myself and go away, and be seen
no more, I am true still."
"Laura,--dearest Laura!" he exclaimed.
"Ah, no!" she said, speaking with no touch of anger, but all in
sorrow;--"it must not be like that. There is no room for that. Nor do
you mean it. I do not think so ill of you. But there may not be even
words of affection between us--only such as I may speak to make you
know that I am your friend."
"You are my friend," he said, stretching out his hand to her as he
turned away his face. "You are my friend, indeed."
"Then do as I would have you do."
He put his hand into his pocket, and had the letter between his
fingers with the purport of showing it to her. But at the moment
the thought occurred to him that were he to do so, then, indeed, he
would be bound for ever. He knew that he was bound for ever,--bound
for ever to his own Mary; but he desired to have the privilege of
thinking over such bondage once more before he proclaimed it even to
his dearest friend. He had told her that she tempted him, and she
stood before him now as a temptress. But lest it might be possible
that she should not tempt in vain,--that letter in his pocket must
never be shown to her. In that case Lady Laura must never hear from
his lips the name of Mary Flood Jones.
He left her without any assured purpose;--without, that is, the
assurance to her of any fixed purpose. There yet wanted a week to the
day on which Mr. Monk's bill was to be read,--or not to be read,--the
second time; and he had still that interval before he need decide.
He went to his club, and before he dined he strove to write a line
to Mary;--but when he had the paper before him he found that it was
impossible to do so. Though he did not even suspect himself of an
intention to be false, the idea that was in his mind made the effort
too much for him. He put the paper away from him and went down and
eat his dinner.
It was a Saturday, and there was no House in the evening. He had
remained in Portman Square with Lady Laura till near seven o'clock,
and was engaged to go out in the evening to a gathering at Mrs.
Gresham's house. Everybody in London would be there, and Phineas
was resolved that as long as he remained in London he would be seen
at places where everybody was seen. He would certainly be at Mrs.
Gresham's gathering; but there was an hour or two before he need
go home to dress, and as he had nothing to do, he went down to the
smoking-room of his club. The seats were crowded, but there was
one vacant; and before he had looked about him to scrutinise his
neighbourhood, he found that he had placed himself with Bonteen on
his right hand and Ratler on his left. There were no two men in all
London whom he more thoroughly disliked; but it was too late for him
to avoid them now.
They instantly attacked him, first on one side and then on the other.
"So I am told you are going to leave us," said Bonteen.
"Who can have been ill-natured enough to whisper such a thing?"
replied Phineas.
"The whispers are very loud, I can tell you," said Ratler. "I think I
know already pretty nearly how every man in the House will vote, and
I have not got your name down on the right side."
"Change it for heaven's sake," said Phineas.
"I will, if you'll tell me seriously that I may," said Ratler.
"My opinion is," said Bonteen, "that a man should be known either as
a friend or foe. I respect a declared foe."
"Know me as a declared foe then," said Phineas, "and respect me."
"That's all very well," said Ratler, "but it means nothing. I've
always had a sort of fear about you, Finn, that you would go over the
traces some day. Of course it's a very grand thing to be
independent."
"The finest thing in the world," said Bonteen; "only so d----d
useless."
"But a man shouldn't be independent and stick to the ship at the
same time. You forget the trouble you cause, and how you upset all
calculations."
"I hadn't thought of the calculations," said Phineas.
"The fact is, Finn," said Bonteen, "you are made of clay too fine for
office. I've always found it has been so with men from your country.
You are the grandest horses in the world to look at out on a prairie,
but you don't like the slavery of harness."
"And the sound of a whip over our shoulders sets us kicking;--does it
not, Ratler?"
"I shall show the list to Gresham to-morrow," said Ratler, "and of
course he can do as he pleases; but I don't understand this kind of
thing."
"Don't you be in a hurry," said Bonteen. "I'll bet you a sovereign
Finn votes with us yet. There's nothing like being a little coy to
set off a girl's charms. I'll bet you a sovereign, Ratler, that Finn
goes out into the lobby with you and me against Monk's bill."
Phineas, not being able to stand any more of this most unpleasant
raillery, got up and went away. The club was distasteful to him, and
he walked off and sauntered for a while about the park. He went down
by the Duke of York's column as though he were going to his office,
which of course was closed at this hour, but turned round when he
got beyond the new public buildings,--buildings which he was never
destined to use in their completed state,--and entered the gates of
the enclosure, and wandered on over the bridge across the water. As
he went his mind was full of thought. Could it be good for him to
give up everything for a fair face? He swore to himself that of all
women whom he had ever seen Mary was the sweetest and the dearest and
the best. If it could be well to lose the world for a woman, it would
be well to lose it for her. Violet, with all her skill, and all her
strength, and all her grace, could never have written such a letter
as that which he still held in his pocket. The best charm of a woman
is that she should be soft, and trusting, and generous; and who ever
had been more soft, more trusting, and more generous than his Mary?
Of course he would be true to her, though he did lose the world.
But to yield such a triumph to the Ratlers and Bonteens whom he left
behind him,--to let them have their will over him,--to know that they
would rejoice scurrilously behind his back over his downfall! The
feeling was terrible to him. The last words which Bonteen had spoken
made it impossible to him now not to support his old friend Mr. Monk.
It was not only what Bonteen had said, but that the words of Mr.
Bonteen so plainly indicated what would be the words of all the other
Bonteens. He knew that he was weak in this. He knew that had he been
strong, he would have allowed himself to be guided,--if not by the
firm decision of his own spirit,--by the counsels of such men as Mr.
Gresham and Lord Cantrip, and not by the sarcasms of the Bonteens and
Ratlers of official life. But men who sojourn amidst savagery fear
the mosquito more than they do the lion. He could not bear to think
that he should yield his blood to such a one as Bonteen.
And he must yield his blood, unless he could vote for Mr. Monk's
motion, and hold his ground afterwards among them all in the House
of Commons. He would at any rate see the session out, and try a
fall with Mr. Bonteen when they should be sitting on different
benches,--if ever fortune should give him an opportunity. And in the
meantime, what should he do about Madame Goesler? What a fate was his
to have the handsomest woman in London with thousands and thousands
a year at his disposal! For,--so he now swore to himself,--Madame
Goesler was the handsomest woman in London, as Mary Flood Jones was
the sweetest girl in the world.
He had not arrived at any decision so fixed as to make him
comfortable when he went home and dressed for Mrs. Gresham's party.
And yet he knew,--he thought that he knew that he would be true to
Mary Flood Jones.
CHAPTER LXX
The Prime Minister's House
The rooms and passages and staircases at Mrs. Gresham's house were
very crowded when Phineas arrived there. Men of all shades of
politics were there, and the wives and daughters of such men; and
there was a streak of royalty in one of the saloons, and a whole
rainbow of foreign ministers with their stars, and two blue ribbons
were to be seen together on the first landing-place, with a stout
lady between them carrying diamonds enough to load a pannier.
Everybody was there. Phineas found that even Lord Chiltern was come,
as he stumbled across his friend on the first foot-ground that he
gained in his ascent towards the rooms. "Halloa,--you here?" said
Phineas. "Yes, by George!" said the other, "but I am going to escape
as soon as possible. I've been trying to make my way up for the last
hour, but could never get round that huge promontory there. Laura was
more persevering." "Is Kennedy here?" Phineas whispered. "I do not
know," said Chiltern, "but she was determined to run the chance."
A little higher up,--for Phineas was blessed with more patience than
Lord Chiltern possessed,--he came upon Mr. Monk. "So you are still
admitted privately," said Phineas.
"Oh dear yes,--and we have just been having a most friendly
conversation about you. What a man he is! He knows everything. He
is so accurate; so just in the abstract,--and in the abstract so
generous!"
"He has been very generous to me in detail as well as in abstract,"
said Phineas.
"Ah, yes; I am not thinking of individuals exactly. His want of
generosity is to large masses,--to a party, to classes, to a people;
whereas his generosity is for mankind at large. He assumes the god,
affects to nod, and seems to shake the spheres. But I have nothing
against him. He has asked me here to-night, and has talked to me most
familiarly about Ireland."
"What do you think of your chance of a second reading?" asked
Phineas.
"What do you think of it?--you hear more of those things than I do."
"Everybody says it will be a close division."
"I never expected it," said Mr. Monk.
"Nor I, till I heard what Daubeny said at the first reading. They
will all vote for the bill en masse,--hating it in their hearts all
the time."
"Let us hope they are not so bad as that."
"It is the way with them always. They do all our work for
us,--sailing either on one tack or the other. That is their use in
creation, that when we split among ourselves, as we always do, they
come in and finish our job for us. It must be unpleasant for them to
be always doing that which they always say should never be done at
all."
"Wherever the gift horse may come from, I shall not look it in the
mouth," said Mr. Monk. "There is only one man in the House whom I
hope I may not see in the lobby with me, and that is yourself."
"The question is decided now," said Phineas.
"And how is it decided?"
Phineas could not tell his friend that a question of so great
magnitude to him had been decided by the last sting which he had
received from an insect so contemptible as Mr. Bonteen, but he
expressed the feeling as well as he knew how to express it. "Oh, I
shall be with you. I know what you are going to say, and I know how
good you are. But I could not stand it. Men are beginning already to
say things which almost make me get up and kick them. If I can help
it, I will give occasion to no man to hint anything to me which
can make me be so wretched as I have been to-day. Pray do not say
anything more. My idea is that I shall resign to-morrow."
"Then I hope that we may fight the battle side by side," said Mr.
Monk, giving him his hand.
"We will fight the battle side by side," replied Phineas.
After that he pushed his way still higher up the stairs, having no
special purpose in view, not dreaming of any such success as that
of reaching his host or hostess,--merely feeling that it should be
a point of honour with him to make a tour through the rooms before
he descended the stairs. The thing, he thought, was to be done with
courage and patience, and this might, probably, be the last time in
his life that he would find himself in the house of a Prime Minister.
Just at the turn of the balustrade at the top of the stairs, he found
Mr. Gresham in the very spot on which Mr. Monk had been talking with
him. "Very glad to see you," said Mr. Gresham. "You, I find, are a
persevering man, with a genius for getting upwards."
"Like the sparks," said Phineas.
"Not quite so quickly," said Mr. Gresham.
"But with the same assurance of speedy loss of my little light."
It did not suit Mr. Gresham to understand this, so he changed the
subject. "Have you seen the news from America?"
"Yes, I have seen it, but do not believe it," said Phineas.
"Ah, you have such faith in a combination of British colonies,
properly backed in Downing Street, as to think them strong
against a world in arms. In your place I should hold to the same
doctrine,--hold to it stoutly."
"And you do now, I hope, Mr. Gresham?"
"Well,--yes,--I am not down-hearted. But I confess to a feeling that
the world would go on even though we had nothing to say to a single
province in North America. But that is for your private ear. You are
not to whisper that in Downing Street." Then there came up somebody
else, and Phineas went on upon his slow course. He had longed for an
opportunity to tell Mr. Gresham that he could go to Downing Street no
more, but such opportunity had not reached him.
For a long time he found himself stuck close by the side of Miss
Fitzgibbon,--Miss Aspasia Fitzgibbon,--who had once relieved him from
terrible pecuniary anxiety by paying for him a sum of money which was
due by him on her brother's account. "It's a very nice thing to be
here, but one does get tired of it," said Miss Fitzgibbon.
"Very tired," said Phineas.
"Of course it is a part of your duty, Mr. Finn. You are on your
promotion and are bound to be here. When I asked Laurence to come, he
said there was nothing to be got till the cards were shuffled again."
"They'll be shuffled very soon," said Phineas.
"Whatever colour comes up, you'll hold trumps, I know," said the
lady. "Some hands always hold trumps." He could not explain to Miss
Fitzgibbon that it would never again be his fate to hold a single
trump in his hand; so he made another fight, and got on a few steps
farther.
He said a word as he went to half a dozen friends,--as friends went
with him. He was detained for five minutes by Lady Baldock, who was
very gracious and very disagreeable. She told him that Violet was in
the room, but where she did not know. "She is somewhere with Lady
Laura, I believe; and really, Mr. Finn, I do not like it." Lady
Baldock had heard that Phineas had quarrelled with Lord Brentford,
but had not heard of the reconciliation. "Really, I do not like it. I
am told that Mr. Kennedy is in the house, and nobody knows what may
happen."
"Mr. Kennedy is not likely to say anything."
"One cannot tell. And when I hear that a woman is separated from her
husband, I always think that she must have been imprudent. It may be
uncharitable, but I think it is most safe so to consider."
"As far as I have heard the circumstances, Lady Laura was quite
right," said Phineas.
"It may be so. Gentlemen will always take the lady's part,--of
course. But I should be very sorry to have a daughter separated from
her husband,--very sorry."
Phineas, who had nothing now to gain from Lady Baldock's favour, left
her abruptly, and went on again. He had a great desire to see Lady
Laura and Violet together, though he could hardly tell himself why.
He had not seen Miss Effingham since his return from Ireland, and he
thought that if he met her alone he could hardly have talked to her
with comfort; but he knew that if he met her with Lady Laura, she
would greet him as a friend, and speak to him as though there were no
cause for embarrassment between them. But he was so far disappointed,
that he suddenly encountered Violet alone. She had been leaning on
the arm of Lord Baldock, and Phineas saw her cousin leave her. But
he would not be such a coward as to avoid her, especially as he knew
that she had seen him. "Oh, Mr. Finn!" she said, "do you see that?"
"See what?"
"Look; There is Mr. Kennedy. We had heard that it was possible, and
Laura made me promise that I would not leave her." Phineas turned his
head, and saw Mr. Kennedy standing with his back bolt upright against
a door-post, with his brow as black as thunder. "She is just opposite
to him, where he can see her," said Violet. "Pray take me to her. He
will think nothing of you, because I know that you are still friends
with both of them. I came away because Lord Baldock wanted to
introduce me to Lady Mouser. You know he is going to marry Miss
Mouser."
Phineas, not caring much about Lord Baldock and Miss Mouser, took
Violet's hand upon his arm, and very slowly made his way across
the room to the spot indicated. There they found Lady Laura alone,
sitting under the upas-tree influence of her husband's gaze. There
was a concourse of people between them, and Mr. Kennedy did not seem
inclined to make any attempt to lessen the distance. But Lady Laura
had found it impossible to move while she was under her husband's
eyes.
"Mr. Finn," she said, "could you find Oswald? I know he is here."
"He has gone," said Phineas. "I was speaking to him downstairs."
"You have not seen my father? He said he would come."
"I have not seen him, but I will search."
"No;--it will do no good. I cannot stay. His carriage is there, I
know,--waiting for me." Phineas immediately started off to have the
carriage called, and promised to return with as much celerity as he
could use. As he went, making his way much quicker through the crowd
than he had done when he had no such object for haste, he purposely
avoided the door by which Mr. Kennedy had stood. It would have been
his nearest way, but his present service, he thought, required that
he should keep aloof from the man. But Mr. Kennedy passed through the
door and intercepted him in his path.
"Is she going?" he asked.
"Well. Yes. I dare say she may before long. I shall look for Lord
Brentford's carriage by-and-by."
"Tell her she need not go because of me. I shall not return. I shall
not annoy her here. It would have been much better that a woman in
such a plight should not have come to such an assembly."
"You would not wish her to shut herself up."
"I would wish her to come back to the home that she has left, and, if
there be any law in the land, she shall be made to do so. You tell
her that I say so." Then Mr. Kennedy fought his way down the stairs,
and Phineas Finn followed in his wake.
About half an hour afterwards Phineas returned to the two ladies with
tidings that the carriage would be at hand as soon as they could be
below. "Did he see you?" said Lady Laura.
"Yes, he followed me."
"And did he speak to you?"
"Yes;--he spoke to me."
"And what did he say?" And then, in the presence of Violet, Phineas
gave the message. He thought it better that it should be given;
and were he to decline to deliver it now, it would never be given.
"Whether there be law in the land to protect me or whether there be
none, I will never live with him," said Lady Laura. "Is a woman like
a head of cattle, that she can be fastened in her crib by force? I
will never live with him though all the judges of the land should
decide that I must do so."
Phineas thought much of all this as he went to his solitary lodgings.
After all, was not the world much better with him than it was with
either of those two wretched married beings? And why? He had not,
at any rate as yet, sacrificed for money or social gains any of
the instincts of his nature. He had been fickle, foolish, vain,
uncertain, and perhaps covetous;--but as yet he had not been false.
Then he took out Mary's last letter and read it again.
CHAPTER LXXI
Comparing Notes
It would, perhaps, be difficult to decide,--between Lord Chiltern and
Miss Effingham,--which had been most wrong, or which had been nearest
to the right, in the circumstances which had led to their separation.
The old lord, wishing to induce his son to undertake work of some
sort, and feeling that his own efforts in this direction were worse
than useless, had closeted himself with his intended daughter-in-law,
and had obtained from her a promise that she would use her influence
with her lover. "Of course I think it right that he should do
something," Violet had said. "And he will if you bid him," replied
the Earl. Violet expressed a great doubt as to this willingness of
obedience; but, nevertheless, she promised to do her best, and she
did her best. Lord Chiltern, when she spoke to him, knit his brows
with an apparent ferocity of anger which his countenance frequently
expressed without any intention of ferocity on his part. He was
annoyed, but was not savagely disposed to Violet. As he looked at
her, however, he seemed to be very savagely disposed. "What is it you
would have me do?" he said.
"I would have you choose some occupation, Oswald."
"What occupation? What is it that you mean? Ought I to be a
shoemaker?"
"Not that by preference, I should say; but that if you please." When
her lover had frowned at her, Violet had resolved,--had strongly
determined, with inward assertions of her own rights,--that she would
not be frightened by him.
"You are talking nonsense, Violet. You know that I cannot be a
shoemaker."
"You may go into Parliament."
"I neither can, nor would I if I could. I dislike the life."
"You might farm."
"I cannot afford it."
"You might,--might do anything. You ought to do something. You know
that you ought. You know that your father is right in what he says."
"That is easily asserted, Violet; but it would, I think, be better
that you should take my part than my father's, if it be that you
intend to be my wife."
"You know that I intend to be your wife; but would you wish that I
should respect my husband?"
"And will you not do so if you marry me?" he asked.
Then Violet looked into his face and saw that the frown was blacker
than ever. The great mark down his forehead was deeper and more
like an ugly wound than she had ever seen it; and his eyes sparkled
with anger; and his face was red as with fiery wrath. If it was so
with him when she was no more than engaged to him, how would it be
when they should be man and wife? At any rate, she would not fear
him,--not now at least. "No, Oswald," she said. "If you resolve upon
being an idle man, I shall not respect you. It is better that I
should tell you the truth."
"A great deal better," he said.
"How can I respect one whose whole life will be,--will be--?"
"Will be what?" he demanded with a loud shout.
"Oswald, you are very rough with me."
"What do you say that my life will be?"
Then she again resolved that she would not fear him. "It will be
discreditable," she said.
"It shall not discredit you," he replied. "I will not bring disgrace
on one I have loved so well. Violet, after what you have said, we had
better part." She was still proud, still determined, and they did
part. Though it nearly broke her heart to see him leave her, she bid
him go. She hated herself afterwards for her severity to him; but,
nevertheless, she would not submit to recall the words which she
had spoken. She had thought him to be wrong, and, so thinking, had
conceived it to be her duty and her privilege to tell him what she
thought. But she had no wish to lose him;--no wish not to be his wife
even, though he should be as idle as the wind. She was so constituted
that she had never allowed him or any other man to be master of her
heart,--till she had with a full purpose given her heart away. The
day before she had resolved to give it to one man, she might, I
think, have resolved to give it to another. Love had not conquered
her, but had been taken into her service. Nevertheless, she could
not now rid herself of her servant, when she found that his services
would stand her no longer in good stead. She parted from Lord
Chiltern with an assent, with an assured brow, and with much dignity
in her gait; but as soon as she was alone she was a prey to remorse.
She had declared to the man who was to have been her husband that
his life was discreditable,--and, of course, no man would bear such
language. Had Lord Chiltern borne it, he would not have been worthy
of her love.
She herself told Lady Laura and Lord Brentford what had
occurred,--and had told Lady Baldock also. Lady Baldock had, of
course, triumphed,--and Violet sought her revenge by swearing that
she would regret for ever the loss of so inestimable a gentleman.
"Then why have you given him up, my dear?" demanded Lady Baldock.
"Because I found that he was too good for me," said Violet. It may be
doubtful whether Lady Baldock was not justified, when she declared
that her niece was to her a care so harassing that no aunt known in
history had ever been so troubled before.
Lord Brentford had fussed and fumed, and had certainly made things
worse. He had quarrelled with his son, and then made it up, and then
quarrelled again,--swearing that the fault must all be attributed to
Chiltern's stubbornness and Chiltern's temper. Latterly, however, by
Lady Laura's intervention, Lord Brentford and his son had again been
reconciled, and the Earl endeavoured manfully to keep his tongue from
disagreeable words, and his face from evil looks, when his son was
present. "They will make it up," Lady Laura had said, "if you and I
do not attempt to make it up for them. If we do, they will never come
together." The Earl was convinced, and did his best. But the task
was very difficult to him. How was he to keep his tongue off his son
while his son was daily saying things of which any father,--any such
father as Lord Brentford,--could not but disapprove? Lord Chiltern
professed to disbelieve even in the wisdom of the House of Lords, and
on one occasion asserted that it must be a great comfort to any Prime
Minister to have three or four old women in the Cabinet. The father,
when he heard this, tried to rebuke his son tenderly, strove even to
be jocose. It was the one wish of his heart that Violet Effingham
should be his daughter-in-law. But even with this wish he found it
very hard to keep his tongue off Lord Chiltern.
When Lady Laura discussed the matter with Violet, Violet would always
declare that there was no hope. "The truth is," she said on the
morning of that day on which they both went to Mrs. Gresham's, "that
though we like each other,--love each other, if you choose to say
so,--we are not fit to be man and wife."
"And why not fit?"
"We are too much alike. Each is too violent, too headstrong, and too
masterful."
"You, as the woman, ought to give way," said Lady Laura.
"But we do not always do just what we ought."
"I know how difficult it is for me to advise, seeing to what a pass I
have brought myself."
"Do not say that, dear;--or rather do say it, for we have, both of
us, brought ourselves to what you call a pass,--to such a pass that
we are like to be able to live together and discuss it for the rest
of our lives. The difference is, I take it, that you have not to
accuse yourself, and that I have."
"I cannot say that I have not to accuse myself," said Lady Laura.
"I do not know that I have done much wrong to Mr. Kennedy since I
married him; but in marrying him I did him a grievous wrong."
"And he has avenged himself."
"We will not talk of vengeance. I believe he is wretched, and I know
that I am;--and that has come of the wrong that I have done."
"I will make no man wretched," said Violet.
"Do you mean that your mind is made up against Oswald?"
"I mean that, and I mean much more. I say that I will make no man
wretched. Your brother is not the only man who is so weak as to be
willing to run the hazard."
"There is Lord Fawn."
"Yes, there is Lord Fawn, certainly. Perhaps I should not do him much
harm; but then I should do him no good."
"And poor Phineas Finn."
"Yes;--there is Mr. Finn. I will tell you something, Laura. The only
man I ever saw in the world whom I have thought for a moment that
it was possible that I should like,--like enough to love as my
husband,--except your brother, was Mr. Finn."
"And now?"
"Oh;--now; of course that is over," said Violet.
"It is over?"
"Quite over. Is he not going to marry Madame Goesler? I suppose
all that is fixed by this time. I hope she will be good to him,
and gracious, and let him have his own way, and give him his tea
comfortably when he comes up tired from the House; for I confess that
my heart is a little tender towards Phineas still. I should not like
to think that he had fallen into the hands of a female Philistine."
"I do not think he will marry Madame Goesler."
"Why not?"
"I can hardly tell you;--but I do not think he will. And you loved
him once,--eh, Violet?"
"Not quite that, my dear. It has been difficult with me to love. The
difficulty with most girls, I fancy, is not to love. Mr. Finn, when I
came to measure him in my mind, was not small, but he was never quite
tall enough. One feels oneself to be a sort of recruiting sergeant,
going about with a standard of inches. Mr. Finn was just half an inch
too short. He lacks something in individuality. He is a little too
much a friend to everybody."
"Shall I tell you a secret, Violet?"
"If you please, dear; though I fancy it is one I know already."
"He is the only man whom I ever loved," said Lady Laura.
"But it was too late when you learned to love him," said Violet.
"It was too late, when I was so sure of it as to wish that I had
never seen Mr. Kennedy. I felt it coming on me, and I argued with
myself that such a marriage would be bad for us both. At that moment
there was trouble in the family, and I had not a shilling of my own."
"You had paid it for Oswald."
"At any rate, I had nothing;--and he had nothing. How could I have
dared to think even of such a marriage?"
"Did he think of it, Laura?"
"I suppose he did."
"You know he did. Did you not tell me before?"
"Well;--yes. He thought of it. I had come to some foolish,
half-sentimental resolution as to friendship, believing that he and I
could be knit together by some adhesion of fraternal affection that
should be void of offence to my husband; and in furtherance of this
he was asked to Loughlinter when I went there, just after I had
accepted Robert. He came down, and I measured him too, as you have
done. I measured him, and I found that he wanted nothing to come up
to the height required by my standard. I think I knew him better than
you did."
"Very possibly;--but why measure him at all, when such measurement
was useless?"
"Can one help such things? He came to me one day as I was sitting up
by the Linter. You remember the place, where it makes its first
leap."
"I remember it very well."
"So do I. Robert had shown it me as the fairest spot in all
Scotland."
"And there this lover of ours sang his song to you?"
"I do not know what he told me then; but I know that I told him that
I was engaged; and I felt when I told him so that my engagement was a
sorrow to me. And it has been a sorrow from that day to this."
"And the hero, Phineas,--he is still dear to you?"
"Dear to me?"
"Yes. You would have hated me, had he become my husband? And you will
hate Madame Goesler when she becomes his wife?"
"Not in the least. I am no dog in the manger. I have even gone so far
as almost to wish, at certain moments, that you should accept him."
"And why?"
"Because he has wished it so heartily."
"One can hardly forgive a man for such speedy changes," said Violet.
"Was I not to forgive him;--I, who had turned myself away from him
with a fixed purpose the moment that I found that he had made a mark
upon my heart? I could not wipe off the mark, and yet I married. Was
he not to try to wipe off his mark?"
"It seems that he wiped it off very quickly;--and since that he has
wiped off another mark. One doesn't know how many marks he has wiped
off. They are like the inn-keeper's score which he makes in chalk. A
damp cloth brings them all away, and leaves nothing behind."
"What would you have?"
"There should be a little notch on the stick,--to remember by," said
Violet. "Not that I complain, you know. I cannot complain, as I was
not notched myself."
"You are silly, Violet."
"In not having allowed myself to be notched by this great champion?"
"A man like Mr. Finn has his life to deal with,--to make the most
of it, and to divide it between work, pleasure, duty, ambition, and
the rest of it as best he may. If he have any softness of heart, it
will be necessary to him that love should bear a part in all these
interests. But a man will be a fool who will allow love to be the
master of them all. He will be one whose mind is so ill-balanced
as to allow him to be the victim of a single wish. Even in a woman
passion such as that is evidence of weakness, and not of strength."
"It seems, then, Laura, that you are weak."
"And if I am, does that condemn him? He is a man, if I judge him
rightly, who will be constant as the sun, when constancy can be of
service."
"You mean that the future Mrs. Finn will be secure?"
"That is what I mean;--and that you or I, had either of us chosen to
take his name, might have been quite secure. We have thought it right
to refuse to do so."
"And how many more, I wonder?"
"You are unjust, and unkind, Violet. So unjust and unkind that it is
clear to me he has just gratified your vanity, and has never touched
your heart. What would you have had him do, when I told him that I
was engaged?"
"I suppose that Mr. Kennedy would not have gone to Blankenberg with
him."
"Violet!"
"That seems to be the proper thing to do. But even that does not
adjust things finally;--does it?" Then some one came upon them, and
the conversation was brought to an end.
CHAPTER LXXII
Madame Goesler's Generosity
When Phineas Finn left Mr. Gresham's house he had quite resolved what
he would do. On the next morning he would tell Lord Cantrip that his
resignation was a necessity, and that he would take that nobleman's
advice as to resigning at once, or waiting till the day on which Mr.
Monk's Irish Bill would be read for the second time.
"My dear Finn, I can only say that I deeply regret it," said Lord
Cantrip.
"So do I. I regret to leave office, which I like,--and which indeed
I want. I regret specially to leave this office, as it has been a
thorough pleasure to me; and I regret, above all, to leave you. But
I am convinced that Monk is right, and I find it impossible not to
support him."
"I wish that Mr. Monk was at Bath," said Lord Cantrip.
Phineas could only smile, and shrug his shoulders, and say that
even though Mr. Monk were at Bath it would not probably make much
difference. When he tendered his letter of resignation, Lord Cantrip
begged him to withdraw it for a day or two. He would, he said, speak
to Mr. Gresham. The debate on the second reading of Mr. Monk's bill
would not take place till that day week, and the resignation would
be in time if it was tendered before Phineas either spoke or voted
against the Government. So Phineas went back to his room, and
endeavoured to make himself useful in some work appertaining to his
favourite Colonies.
That conversation had taken place on a Friday, and on the
following Sunday, early in the day, he left his rooms after a late
breakfast,--a prolonged breakfast, during which he had been studying
tenant-right statistics, preparing his own speech, and endeavouring
to look forward into the future which that speech was to do so much
to influence,--and turned his face towards Park Lane. There had been
a certain understanding between him and Madame Goesler that he was
to call in Park Lane on this Sunday morning, and then declare to her
what was his final resolve as to the office which he held. "It is
simply to bid her adieu," he said to himself, "for I shall hardly
see her again." And yet, as he took off his morning easy coat, and
dressed himself for the streets, and stood for a moment before his
looking-glass, and saw that his gloves were fresh and that his boots
were properly polished, I think there was a care about his person
which he would have hardly taken had he been quite assured that he
simply intended to say good-bye to the lady whom he was about to
visit. But if there were any such conscious feeling, he administered
to himself an antidote before he left the house. On returning to the
sitting-room he went to a little desk from which he took out the
letter from Mary which the reader has seen, and carefully perused
every word of it. "She is the best of them all," he said to himself,
as he refolded the letter and put it back into his desk. I am not
sure that it is well that a man should have any large number from
whom to select a best; as, in such circumstances, he is so very apt
to change his judgment from hour to hour. The qualities which are the
most attractive before dinner sometimes become the least so in the
evening.
The morning was warm, and he took a cab. It would not do that he
should speak even his last farewell to such a one as Madame Goesler
with all the heat and dust of a long walk upon him. Having been so
careful about his boots and gloves he might as well use his care to
the end. Madame Goesler was a very pretty woman, who spared herself
no trouble in making herself as pretty as Nature would allow, on
behalf of those whom she favoured with her smiles; and to such a lady
some special attention was due by one who had received so many of her
smiles as had Phineas. And he felt, too, that there was something
special in this very visit. It was to be made by appointment, and
there had come to be an understanding between them that Phineas
should tell her on this occasion what was his resolution with
reference to his future life. I think that he had been very wise in
fortifying himself with a further glance at our dear Mary's letter,
before he trusted himself within Madame Goesler's door.
Yes;--Madame Goesler was at home. The door was opened by Madame
Goesler's own maid, who, smiling, explained that the other servants
were all at church. Phineas had become sufficiently intimate at the
cottage in Park Lane to be on friendly terms with Madame Goesler's
own maid, and now made some little half-familiar remark as to the
propriety of his visit during church time. "Madame will not refuse to
see you, I am thinking," said the girl, who was a German. "And she
is alone?" asked Phineas. "Alone? Yes;--of course she is alone. Who
should be with her now?" Then she took him up into the drawing-room;
but, when there, he found that Madame Goesler was absent. "She shall
be down directly," said the girl. "I shall tell her who is here, and
she will come."
It was a very pretty room. It may almost be said that there could be
no prettier room in all London. It looked out across certain small
private gardens,--which were as bright and gay as money could make
them when brought into competition with London smoke,--right on to
the park. Outside and inside the window, flowers and green things
were so arranged that the room itself almost looked as though it
were a bower in a garden. And everything in that bower was rich and
rare; and there was nothing there which annoyed by its rarity or was
distasteful by its richness. The seats, though they were costly as
money could buy, were meant for sitting, and were comfortable as
seats. There were books for reading, and the means of reading them.
Two or three gems of English art were hung upon the walls, and
could be seen backwards and forwards in the mirrors. And there
were precious toys lying here and there about the room,--toys very
precious, but placed there not because of their price, but because of
their beauty. Phineas already knew enough of the art of living to be
aware that the woman who had made that room what it was, had charms
to add a beauty to everything she touched. What would such a life as
his want, if graced by such a companion,--such a life as his might
be, if the means which were hers were at his command? It would want
one thing, he thought,--the self-respect which he would lose if he
were false to the girl who was trusting him with such sweet trust at
home in Ireland.
In a very few minutes Madame Goesler was with him, and, though he did
not think about it, he perceived that she was bright in her apparel,
that her hair was as soft as care could make it, and that every charm
belonging to her had been brought into use for his gratification. He
almost told himself that he was there in order that he might ask to
have all those charms bestowed upon himself. He did not know who had
lately come to Park Lane and been a suppliant for the possession of
those rich endowments; but I wonder whether they would have been more
precious in his eyes had he known that they had so moved the heart
of the great Duke as to have induced him to lay his coronet at the
lady's feet. I think that had he known that the lady had refused the
coronet, that knowledge would have enhanced the value of the prize.
"I am so sorry to have kept you waiting," she said, as she gave him
her hand. "I was an owl not to be ready for you when you told me that
you would come."
"No;--but a bird of paradise to come to me so sweetly, and at an
hour when all the other birds refuse to show the feather of a single
wing."
"And you,--you feel like a naughty boy, do you not, in thus coming
out on a Sunday morning?"
"Do you feel like a naughty girl?"
"Yes;--just a little so. I do not know that I should care for
everybody to hear that I received visitors,--or worse still, a
visitor,--at this hour on this day. But then it is so pleasant to
feel oneself to be naughty! There is a Bohemian flavour of picnic
about it which, though it does not come up to the rich gusto of
real wickedness, makes one fancy that one is on the border of that
delightful region in which there is none of the constraint of
custom,--where men and women say what they like, and do what they
like."
"It is pleasant enough to be on the borders," said Phineas.
"That is just it. Of course decency, morality, and propriety, all
made to suit the eye of the public, are the things which are really
delightful. We all know that, and live accordingly,--as well as we
can. I do at least."
"And do not I, Madame Goesler?"
"I know nothing about that, Mr. Finn, and want to ask no questions.
But if you do, I am sure you agree with me that you often envy the
improper people,--the Bohemians,--the people who don't trouble
themselves about keeping any laws except those for breaking which
they would be put into nasty, unpleasant prisons. I envy them. Oh,
how I envy them!"
"But you are free as air."
"The most cabined, cribbed, and confined creature in the world! I
have been fighting my way up for the last four years, and have not
allowed myself the liberty of one flirtation;--not often even the
recreation of a natural laugh. And now I shouldn't wonder if I don't
find myself falling back a year or two, just because I have allowed
you to come and see me on a Sunday morning. When I told Lotta that
you were coming, she shook her head at me in dismay. But now that you
are here, tell me what you have done."
"Nothing as yet, Madame Goesler."
"I thought it was to have been settled on Friday?"
"It was settled,--before Friday. Indeed, as I look back at it all
now, I can hardly tell when it was not settled. It is impossible,
and has been impossible, that I should do otherwise. I still hold my
place, Madame Goesler, but I have declared that I shall give it up
before the debate comes on."
"It is quite fixed?"
"Quite fixed, my friend."
"And what next?" Madame Goesler, as she thus interrogated him, was
leaning across towards him from the sofa on which she was placed,
with both her elbows resting on a small table before her. We all know
that look of true interest which the countenance of a real friend
will bear when the welfare of his friend is in question. There are
doubtless some who can assume it without feeling,--as there are
actors who can personate all the passions. But in ordinary life we
think that we can trust such a face, and that we know the true look
when we see it. Phineas, as he gazed into Madame Goesler's eyes, was
sure that the lady opposite him was not acting. She at least was
anxious for his welfare, and was making his cares her own. "What
next?" said she, repeating her words in a tone that was somewhat
hurried.
"I do not know that there will be any next. As far as public life is
concerned, there will be no next for me, Madame Goesler."
"That is out of the question," she said. "You are made for public
life."
"Then I shall be untrue to my making, I fear. But to speak plainly--"
"Yes; speak plainly. I want to understand the reality."
"The reality is this. I shall keep my seat to the end of the session,
as I think I may be of use. After that I shall give it up."
"Resign that too?" she said in a tone of chagrin.
"The chances are, I think, that there will be another dissolution. If
they hold their own against Mr. Monk's motion, then they will pass an
Irish Reform Bill. After that I think they must dissolve."
"And you will not come forward again?"
"I cannot afford it."
"Psha! Some five hundred pounds or so!"
"And, besides that, I am well aware that my only chance at my old
profession is to give up all idea of Parliament. The two things are
not compatible for a beginner at the law. I know it now, and have
bought my knowledge by a bitter experience."
"And where will you live?"
"In Dublin, probably."
"And you will do,--will do what?"
"Anything honest in a barrister's way that may be brought to me. I
hope that I may never descend below that."
"You will stand up for all the blackguards, and try to make out that
the thieves did not steal?"
"It may be that that sort of work may come in my way."
"And you will wear a wig and try to look wise?"
"The wig is not universal in Ireland, Madame Goesler."
"And you will wrangle, as though your very soul were in it, for
somebody's twenty pounds?"
"Exactly."
"You have already made a name in the greatest senate in the world,
and have governed other countries larger than your own--"
"No;--I have not done that. I have governed no country.
"I tell you, my friend, that you cannot do it. It is out of the
question. Men may move forward from little work to big work; but they
cannot move back and do little work, when they have had tasks which
were really great. I tell you, Mr. Finn, that the House of Parliament
is the place for you to work in. It is the only place;--that and the
abodes of Ministers. Am not I your friend who tell you this?"
"I know that you are my friend."
"And will you not credit me when I tell you this? What do you fear,
that you should run away? You have no wife;--no children. What is the
coming misfortune that you dread?" She paused a moment as though for
an answer, and he felt that now had come the time in which it would
be well that he should tell her of his engagement with his own Mary.
She had received him very playfully; but now within the last few
minutes there had come upon her a seriousness of gesture, and almost
a solemnity of tone, which made him conscious that he should in no
way trifle with her. She was so earnest in her friendship that he
owed it to her to tell her everything. But before he could think of
the words in which his tale should be told, she had gone on with her
quick questions. "Is it solely about money that you fear?" she said.
"It is simply that I have no income on which to live."
"Have I not offered you money?"
"But, Madame Goesler, you who offer it would yourself despise me if I
took it."
"No;--I do deny it." As she said this,--not loudly but with much
emphasis,--she came and stood before him where he was sitting. And as
he looked at her he could perceive that there was a strength about
her of which he had not been aware. She was stronger, larger, more
robust physically than he had hitherto conceived. "I do deny it," she
said. "Money is neither god nor devil, that it should make one noble
and another vile. It is an accident, and, if honestly possessed, may
pass from you to me, or from me to you, without a stain. You may
take my dinner from me if I give it you, my flowers, my friendship,
my,--my,--my everything, but my money! Explain to me the cause of the
phenomenon. If I give to you a thousand pounds, now this moment, and
you take it, you are base;--but if I leave it you in my will,--and
die,--you take it, and are not base. Explain to me the cause of
that."
"You have not said it quite all," said Phineas hoarsely.
"What have I left unsaid? If I have left anything unsaid, do you say
the rest."
"It is because you are a woman, and young, and beautiful, that no man
may take wealth from your hands."
"Oh, it is that!"
"It is that partly,"
"If I were a man you might take it, though I were young and beautiful
as the morning?"
"No;--presents of money are always bad. They stain and load the
spirit, and break the heart."
"And specially when given by a woman's hand?"
"It seems so to me. But I cannot argue of it. Do not let us talk of
it any more."
"Nor can I argue. I cannot argue, but I can be generous,--very
generous. I can deny myself for my friend,--can even lower myself in
my own esteem for my friend. I can do more than a man can do for a
friend. You will not take money from my hand?"
"No, Madame Goesler;--I cannot do that."
"Take the hand then first. When it and all that it holds are your
own, you can help yourself as you list." So saying, she stood before
him with her right hand stretched out towards him.
What man will say that he would not have been tempted? Or what woman
will declare that such temptation should have had no force? The very
air of the room in which she dwelt was sweet in his nostrils, and
there hovered around her an halo of grace and beauty which greeted
all his senses. She invited him to join his lot to hers, in order
that she might give to him all that was needed to make his life rich
and glorious. How would the Ratlers and the Bonteens envy him when
they heard of the prize which had become his! The Cantrips and the
Greshams would feel that he was a friend doubly valuable, if he could
be won back; and Mr. Monk would greet him as a fitting ally,--an ally
strong with the strength which he had before wanted. With whom would
he not be equal? Whom need he fear? Who would not praise him? The
story of his poor Mary would be known only in a small village, out
beyond the Channel. The temptation certainly was very strong.
But he had not a moment in which to doubt. She was standing there
with her face turned from him, but with her hand still stretched
towards him. Of course he took it. What man so placed could do other
than take a woman's hand?
"My friend," he said.
"I will be called friend by you no more," she said. "You must call me
Marie, your own Marie, or you must never call me by any name again.
Which shall it be, sir?" He paused a moment, holding her hand, and
she let it lie there for an instant while she listened. But still she
did not look at him. "Speak to me! Tell me! Which shall it be?" Still
he paused. "Speak to me. Tell me!" she said again.
"It cannot be as you have hinted to me," he said at last. His words
did not come louder than a low whisper; but they were plainly heard,
and instantly the hand was withdrawn.
"Cannot be!" she exclaimed. "Then I have betrayed myself."
"No;--Madame Goesler."
"Sir; I say yes! If you will allow me I will leave you. You will, I
know, excuse me if I am abrupt to you." Then she strode out of the
room, and was no more seen of the eyes of Phineas Finn.
He never afterwards knew how he escaped out of that room and found
his way into Park Lane. In after days he had some memory that he
remained there, he knew not how long, standing on the very spot on
which she had left him; and that at last there grew upon him almost a
fear of moving, a dread lest he should be heard, an inordinate desire
to escape without the sound of a footfall, without the clicking of
a lock. Everything in that house had been offered to him. He had
refused it all, and then felt that of all human beings under the
sun none had so little right to be standing there as he. His very
presence in that drawing-room was an insult to the woman whom he had
driven from it.
But at length he was in the street, and had found his way across
Piccadilly into the Green Park. Then, as soon as he could find a spot
apart from the Sunday world, he threw himself upon the turf; and
tried to fix his thoughts upon the thing that he had done. His first
feeling, I think, was one of pure and unmixed disappointment;--of
disappointment so bitter, that even the vision of his own Mary did
not tend to comfort him. How great might have been his success, and
how terrible was his failure! Had he taken the woman's hand and her
money, had he clenched his grasp on the great prize offered to him,
his misery would have been ten times worse the first moment that he
would have been away from her. Then, indeed,--it being so that he
was a man with a heart within his breast,--there would have been no
comfort for him, in his outlooks on any side. But even now, when he
had done right,--knowing well that he had done right,--he found that
comfort did not come readily within his reach.
CHAPTER LXXIII
Amantium Iræ
Miss Effingham's life at this time was not the happiest in the world.
Her lines, as she once said to her friend Lady Laura, were not
laid for her in pleasant places. Her residence was still with her
aunt, and she had come to find that it was almost impossible any
longer to endure Lady Baldock, and quite impossible to escape from
Lady Baldock. In former days she had had a dream that she might
escape, and live alone if she chose to be alone; that she might be
independent in her life, as a man is independent, if she chose to
live after that fashion; that she might take her own fortune in her
own hand, as the law certainly allowed her to do, and act with it as
she might please. But latterly she had learned to understand that all
this was not possible for her. Though one law allowed it, another law
disallowed it, and the latter law was at least as powerful as the
former. And then her present misery was enhanced by the fact that
she was now banished from the second home which she had formerly
possessed. Hitherto she had always been able to escape from Lady
Baldock to the house of her friend, but now such escape was out of
the question. Lady Laura and Lord Chiltern lived in the same house,
and Violet could not live with them.
Lady Baldock understood all this, and tortured her niece accordingly.
It was not premeditated torture. The aunt did not mean to make her
niece's life a burden to her, and, so intending, systematically work
upon a principle to that effect. Lady Baldock, no doubt, desired
to do her duty conscientiously. But the result was torture to poor
Violet, and a strong conviction on the mind of each of the two ladies
that the other was the most unreasonable being in the world.
The aunt, in these days, had taken it into her head to talk of poor
Lord Chiltern. This arose partly from a belief that the quarrel was
final, and that, therefore, there would be no danger in aggravating
Violet by this expression of pity,--partly from a feeling that it
would be better that her niece should marry Lord Chiltern than that
she should not marry at all,--and partly, perhaps, from the general
principle that, as she thought it right to scold her niece on all
occasions, this might be best done by taking an opposite view of
all questions to that taken by the niece to be scolded. Violet was
supposed to regard Lord Chiltern as having sinned against her, and
therefore Lady Baldock talked of "poor Lord Chiltern." As to the
other lovers, she had begun to perceive that their conditions were
hopeless. Her daughter Augusta had explained to her that there was
no chance remaining either for Phineas, or for Lord Fawn, or for Mr.
Appledom. "I believe she will be an old maid, on purpose to bring me
to my grave," said Lady Baldock. When, therefore, Lady Baldock was
told one day that Lord Chiltern was in the house, and was asking to
see Miss Effingham, she did not at once faint away, and declare that
they would all be murdered,--as she would have done some months
since. She was perplexed by a double duty. If it were possible that
Violet should relent and be reconciled, then it would be her duty to
save Violet from the claws of the wild beast. But if there was no
such chance, then it would be her duty to poor Lord Chiltern to see
that he was not treated with contumely and ill-humour.
"Does she know that he is here?" Lady Baldock asked her daughter.
"Not yet, mamma."
"Oh dear, oh dear! I suppose she ought to see him. She has given him
so much encouragement!"
"I suppose she will do as she pleases, mamma."
"Augusta, how can you talk in that way? Am I to have no control in my
own house?" It was, however, soon apparent to her that in this matter
she was to have no control.
"Lord Chiltern is down-stairs," said Violet, coming into the room
abruptly.
"So Augusta tells me. Sit down, my dear."
"I cannot sit down, aunt,--not just now. I have sent down to say that
I would be with him in a minute. He is the most impatient soul alive,
and I must not keep him waiting."
"And you mean to see him?"
"Certainly I shall see him," said Violet, as she left the room.
"I wonder that any woman should ever take upon herself the charge of
a niece!" said Lady Baldock to her daughter in a despondent tone, as
she held up her hands in dismay. In the meantime, Violet had gone
down-stairs with a quick step, and had then boldly entered the room
in which her lover was waiting to receive her.
"I have to thank you for coming to me, Violet," said Lord Chiltern.
There was still in his face something of savagery,--an expression
partly of anger and partly of resolution to tame the thing with which
he was angry. Violet did not regard the anger half so keenly as she
did that resolution of taming. An angry lord, she thought, she could
endure, but she could not bear the idea of being tamed by any one.
"Why should I not come?" she said. "Of course I came when I was told
that you were here. I do not think that there need be a quarrel
between us, because we have changed our minds."
"Such changes make quarrels," said he.
"It shall not do so with me, unless you choose that it shall," said
Violet. "Why should we be enemies,--we who have known each other
since we were children? My dearest friends are your father and your
sister. Why should we be enemies?"
"I have come to ask you whether you think that I have ill-used you?"
"Ill-used me! Certainly not. Has any one told you that I have accused
you?"
"No one has told me so."
"Then why do you ask me?"
"Because I would not have you think so,--if I could help it. I did
not intend to be rough with you. When you told me that my life was
disreputable--"
"Oh, Oswald, do not let us go back to that. What good will it do?"
"But you said so."
"I think not."
"I believe that that was your word,--the harshest word that you could
use in all the language."
"I did not mean to be harsh. If I used it, I will beg your pardon.
Only let there be an end of it. As we think so differently about life
in general, it was better that we should not be married. But that
is settled, and why should we go back to words that were spoken in
haste, and which are simply disagreeable?"
"I have come to know whether it is settled."
"Certainly. You settled it yourself, Oswald. I told you what I
thought myself bound to tell you. Perhaps I used language which I
should not have used. Then you told me that I could not be your
wife;--and I thought you were right, quite right."
"I was wrong, quite wrong," he said impetuously. "So wrong, that I
can never forgive myself, if you do not relent. I was such a fool,
that I cannot forgive myself my folly. I had known before that I
could not live without you; and when you were mine, I threw you away
for an angry word."
"It was not an angry word," she said.
"Say it again, and let me have another chance to answer it."
"I think I said that idleness was not,--respectable, or something
like that, taken out of a copy-book probably. But you are a man who
do not like rebukes, even out of copy-books. A man so thin-skinned
as you are must choose for himself a wife with a softer tongue than
mine."
"I will choose none other!" he said. But still he was savage in his
tone and in his gestures. "I made my choice long since, as you know
well enough. I do not change easily. I cannot change in this. Violet,
say that you will be my wife once more, and I will swear to work for
you like a coal-heaver."
"My wish is that my husband,--should I ever have one,--should work,
not exactly as a coal-heaver."
"Come, Violet," he said,--and now the look of savagery departed from
him, and there came a smile over his face, which, however, had in it
more of sadness than of hope or joy,--"treat me fairly,--or rather,
treat me generously if you can. I do not know whether you ever loved
me much."
"Very much,--years ago, when you were a boy."
"But not since? If it be so, I had better go. Love on one side only
is a poor affair at best."
"A very poor affair."
"It is better to bear anything than to try and make out life with
that. Some of you women never want to love any one."
"That was what I was saying of myself to Laura but the other day.
With some women it is so easy. With others it is so difficult, that
perhaps it never comes to them."
"And with you?"
"Oh, with me--. But it is better in these matters to confine
oneself to generalities. If you please, I will not describe myself
personally. Were I to do so, doubtless I should do it falsely."
"You love no one else, Violet?"
"That is my affair, my lord."
"By heavens, and it is mine too. Tell me that you do, and I will
go away and leave you at once. I will not ask his name, and I will
trouble you no more. If it is not so, and if it is possible that you
should forgive me--"
"Forgive you! When have I been angry with you?"
"Answer me my question, Violet."
"I will not answer you your question,--not that one."
"What question will you answer?"
"Any that may concern yourself and myself. None that may concern
other people."
"You told me once that you loved me."
"This moment I told you that I did so,--years ago."
"But now?"
"That is another matter."
"Violet, do you love me now?"
"That is a point-blank question at any rate," she said.
"And you will answer it?"
"I must answer it,--I suppose."
"Well, then?"
"Oh, Oswald, what a fool you are! Love you! of course I love you.
If you can understand anything, you ought to know that I have never
loved any one else;--that after what has passed between us, I never
shall love any one else. I do love you. There. Whether you throw me
away from you, as you did the other day,--with great scorn, mind
you,--or come to me with sweet, beautiful promises, as you do now, I
shall love you all the same. I cannot be your wife, if you will not
have me; can I? When you run away in your tantrums because I quote
something out of the copy-book, I can't run after you. It would not
be pretty. But as for loving you, if you doubt that, I tell you, you
are a--fool." As she spoke the last words she pouted out her lips at
him, and when he looked into her face he saw that her eyes were full
of tears. He was standing now with his arm round her waist, so that
it was not easy for him to look into her face.
"I am a fool," he said.
"Yes;--you are; but I don't love you the less on that account."
"I will never doubt it again."
"No;--do not; and, for me, I will not say another word, whether you
choose to heave coals or not. You shall do as you please. I meant to
be very wise;--I did indeed."
"You are the grandest girl that ever was made."
"I do not want to be grand at all, and I never will be wise any more.
Only do not frown at me and look savage." Then she put up her hand
to smooth his brow. "I am half afraid of you still, you know. There.
That will do. Now let me go, that I may tell my aunt. During the last
two months she has been full of pity for poor Lord Chiltern."
"It has been poor Lord Chiltern with a vengeance!" said he.
"But now that we have made it up, she will be horrified again at all
your wickednesses. You have been a turtle dove lately;--now you will
be an ogre again. But, Oswald, you must not be an ogre to me."
As soon as she could get quit of her lover, she did tell her tale to
Lady Baldock. "You have accepted him again!" said her aunt, holding
up her hands. "Yes,--I have accepted him again," replied Violet.
"Then the responsibility must be on your own shoulders," said her
aunt; "I wash my hands of it." That evening, when she discussed the
matter with her daughter, Lady Baldock spoke of Violet and Lord
Chiltern, as though their intended marriage were the one thing in the
world which she most deplored.
CHAPTER LXXIV
The Beginning of the End
The day of the debate had come, and Phineas Finn was still sitting in
his room at the Colonial Office. But his resignation had been sent in
and accepted, and he was simply awaiting the coming of his successor.
About noon his successor came, and he had the gratification of
resigning his arm-chair to Mr. Bonteen. It is generally understood
that gentlemen leaving offices give up either seals or a portfolio.
Phineas had been put in possession of no seal and no portfolio; but
there was in the room which he had occupied a special arm-chair, and
this with much regret he surrendered to the use and comfort of Mr.
Bonteen. There was a glance of triumph in his enemy's eyes, and an
exultation in the tone of his enemy's voice, which were very bitter
to him. "So you are really going?" said Mr. Bonteen. "Well; I dare
say it is all very proper. I don't quite understand the thing myself,
but I have no doubt you are right." "It isn't easy to understand; is
it?" said Phineas, trying to laugh. But Mr. Bonteen did not feel the
intended satire, and poor Phineas found it useless to attempt to
punish the man he hated. He left him as quickly as he could, and went
to say a few words of farewell to his late chief.
"Good-bye, Finn," said Lord Cantrip. "It is a great trouble to me
that we should have to part in this way."
"And to me also, my lord. I wish it could have been avoided."
"You should not have gone to Ireland with so dangerous a man as Mr.
Monk. But it is too late to think of that now."
"The milk is spilt; is it not?"
"But these terrible rendings asunder never last very long," said
Lord Cantrip, "unless a man changes his opinions altogether. How
many quarrels and how many reconciliations we have lived to see! I
remember when Gresham went out of office, because he could not sit
in the same room with Mr. Mildmay, and yet they became the fastest
of political friends. There was a time when Plinlimmon and the Duke
could not stable their horses together at all; and don't you remember
when Palliser was obliged to give up his hopes of office because he
had some bee in his bonnet?" I think, however, that the bee in Mr.
Palliser's bonnet to which Lord Cantrip was alluding made its buzzing
audible on some subject that was not exactly political. "We shall
have you back again before long, I don't doubt. Men who can really do
their work are too rare to be left long in the comfort of the benches
below the gangway." This was very kindly said, and Phineas was
flattered and comforted. He could not, however, make Lord Cantrip
understand the whole truth. For him the dream of a life of politics
was over for ever. He had tried it, and had succeeded beyond his
utmost hopes; but, in spite of his success, the ground had crumbled
to pieces beneath his feet, and he knew that he could never recover
the niche in the world's gallery which he was now leaving.
That same afternoon he met Mr. Gresham in one of the passages leading
to the House, and the Prime Minister put his arm through that of our
hero as they walked together into the lobby. "I am sorry that we are
losing you," said Mr. Gresham.
"You may be sure that I am sorry to be so lost," said Phineas.
"These things will occur in political life," said the leader; "but
I think that they seldom leave rancour behind them when the purpose
is declared, and when the subject of disagreement is marked and
understood. The defalcation which creates angry feeling is that which
has to be endured without previous warning,--when a man votes against
his party,--or a set of men, from private pique or from some cause
which is never clear." Phineas, when he heard this, knew well how
terribly this very man had been harassed, and driven nearly wild,
by defalcation, exactly of that nature which he was attempting to
describe. "No doubt you and Mr. Monk think you are right," continued
Mr. Gresham.
"We have given strong evidence that we think so," said Phineas. "We
give up our places, and we are, both of us, very poor men."
"I think you are wrong, you know, not so much in your views on the
question itself--which, to tell the truth, I hardly understand as
yet."
"We will endeavour to explain them."
"And will do so very clearly, no doubt. But I think that Mr. Monk was
wrong in desiring, as a member of a Government, to force a measure
which, whether good or bad, the Government as a body does not desire
to initiate,--at any rate, just now."
"And therefore he resigned," said Phineas.
"Of course. But it seems to me that he failed to comprehend the only
way in which a great party can act together, if it is to do any
service in this country. Don't for a moment think that I am blaming
him or you."
"I am nobody in this matter," said Phineas.
"I can assure you, Mr. Finn, that we have not regarded you in that
light, and I hope that the time may come when we may be sitting
together again on the same bench."
Neither on the Treasury bench nor on any other in that House was
he to sit again after this fashion! That was the trouble which was
crushing his spirit at this moment, and not the loss of his office!
He knew that he could not venture to think of remaining in London
as a member of Parliament with no other income than that which his
father could allow him, even if he could again secure a seat in
Parliament. When he had first been returned for Loughshane he had
assured his friends that his duty as a member of the House of Commons
would not be a bar to his practice in the Courts. He had now been
five years a member, and had never once made an attempt at doing any
part of a barrister's work. He had gone altogether into a different
line of life, and had been most successful;--so successful that men
told him, and women more frequently than men, that his career had
been a miracle of success. But there had been, as he had well known
from the first, this drawback in the new profession which he had
chosen, that nothing in it could be permanent. They who succeed in
it, may probably succeed again; but then the success is intermittent,
and there may be years of hard work in opposition, to which,
unfortunately, no pay is assigned. It is almost imperative, as he now
found, that they who devote themselves to such a profession should
be men of fortune. When he had commenced his work,--at the period of
his first return for Loughshane,--he had had no thought of mending
his deficiency in this respect by a rich marriage. Nor had it ever
occurred to him that he would seek a marriage for that purpose. Such
an idea would have been thoroughly distasteful to him. There had been
no stain of premeditated mercenary arrangement upon him at any time.
But circumstances had so fallen out with him, that as he won his
spurs in Parliament, as he became known, and was placed first in one
office and then in another, prospects of love and money together were
opened to him, and he ventured on, leaving Mr. Low and the law behind
him,--because these prospects were so alluring. Then had come Mr.
Monk and Mary Flood Jones,--and everything around him had collapsed.
Everything around him had collapsed,--with, however, a terrible
temptation to him to inflate his sails again, at the cost of his
truth and his honour. The temptation would have affected him
not at all, had Madame Goesler been ugly, stupid, or personally
disagreeable. But she was, he thought, the most beautiful woman
he had ever seen, the most witty, and in many respects the most
charming. She had offered to give him everything that she had, so to
place him in the world that opposition would be more pleasant to him
than office, to supply every want, and had done so in a manner that
had gratified all his vanity. But he had refused it all, because he
was bound to the girl at Floodborough. My readers will probably say
that he was not a true man unless he could do this without a regret.
When Phineas thought of it all, there were many regrets.
But there was at the same time a resolve on his part, that if any man
had ever loved the girl he promised to love, he would love Mary Flood
Jones. A thousand times he had told himself that she had not the
spirit of Lady Laura, or the bright wit of Violet Effingham, or the
beauty of Madame Goesler. But Mary had charms of her own that were
more valuable than them all. Was there one among the three who had
trusted him as she trusted him,--or loved him with the same satisfied
devotion? There were regrets, regrets that were heavy on his
heart;--for London, and Parliament, and the clubs, and Downing
Street, had become dear to him. He liked to think of himself as he
rode in the park, and was greeted by all those whose greeting was
the most worth having. There were regrets,--sad regrets. But the
girl whom he loved better than the parks and the clubs,--better even
than Westminster and Downing Street, should never know that they had
existed.
These thoughts were running through his mind even while he was
listening to Mr. Monk, as he propounded his theory of doing justice
to Ireland. This might probably be the last great debate in which
Phineas would be able to take a part, and he was determined that he
would do his best in it. He did not intend to speak on this day, if,
as was generally supposed, the House would be adjourned before a
division could be obtained. But he would remain on the alert and see
how the thing went. He had come to understand the forms of the place,
and was as well-trained a young member of Parliament as any there. He
had been quick at learning a lesson that is not easily learned, and
knew how things were going, and what were the proper moments for this
question or that form of motion. He could anticipate a count-out,
understood the tone of men's minds, and could read the gestures of
the House. It was very little likely that the debate should be over
to-night. He knew that; and as the present time was the evening of
Tuesday, he resolved at once that he would speak as early as he could
on the following Thursday. What a pity it was, that with one who had
learned so much, all his learning should be in vain!
At about two o'clock, he himself succeeded in moving the adjournment
of the debate. This he did from a seat below the gangway, to which he
had removed himself from the Treasury bench. Then the House was up,
and he walked home with Mr. Monk. Mr. Monk, since he had been told
positively by Phineas that he had resolved upon resigning his office,
had said nothing more of his sorrow at his friend's resolve, but had
used him as one political friend uses another, telling him all his
thoughts and all his hopes as to this new measure of his, and taking
counsel with him as to the way in which the fight should be fought.
Together they had counted over the list of members, marking these
men as supporters, those as opponents, and another set, now more
important than either, as being doubtful. From day to day those who
had been written down as doubtful were struck off that third list,
and put in either the one or the other of those who were either
supporters or opponents. And their different modes of argument were
settled between these two allied orators, how one should take this
line and the other that. To Mr. Monk this was very pleasant. He was
quite assured now that opposition was more congenial to his spirit,
and more fitting for him than office. There was no doubt to him as
to his future sitting in Parliament, let the result of this contest
be what it might. The work which he was now doing, was the work for
which he had been training himself all his life. While he had been
forced to attend Cabinet Councils from week to week, he had been
depressed. Now he was exultant. Phineas seeing and understanding all
this, said but little to his friend of his own prospects. As long as
this pleasant battle was raging, he could fight in it shoulder to
shoulder with the man he loved. After that there would be a blank.
"I do not see how we are to fail to have a majority after Daubeny's
speech to-night," said Mr. Monk, as they walked together down
Parliament Street through the bright moonlight.
"He expressly said that he only spoke for himself," said Phineas.
"But we know what that means. He is bidding for office, and of course
those who want office with him will vote as he votes. We have already
counted those who would go into office, but they will not carry the
whole party."
"It will carry enough of them."
"There are forty or fifty men on his side of the House, and as many
perhaps on ours," said Mr. Monk, "who have no idea of any kind on
any bill, and who simply follow the bell, whether into this lobby
or that. Argument never touches them. They do not even look to the
result of a division on their own interests, as the making of any
calculation would be laborious to them. Their party leader is to them
a Pope whom they do not dream of doubting. I never can quite make up
my mind whether it is good or bad that there should be such men in
Parliament."
"Men who think much want to speak often," said Phineas.
"Exactly so,--and of speaking members, God knows that we have enough.
And I suppose that these purblind sheep do have some occult weight
that is salutary. They enable a leader to be a leader, and even in
that way they are useful. We shall get a division on Thursday."
"I understand that Gresham has consented to that."
"So Ratler told me. Palliser is to speak, and Barrington Erle. And
they say that Robson is going to make an onslaught specially on me.
We shall get it over by one o'clock."
"And if we beat them?" asked Phineas.
"It will depend on the numbers. Everybody who has spoken to me about
it, seems to think that they will dissolve if there be a respectable
majority against them."
"Of course he will dissolve," said Phineas, speaking of Mr. Gresham;
"what else can he do?"
"He is very anxious to carry his Irish Reform Bill first, if he can
do so. Good-night, Phineas. I shall not be down to-morrow as there
is nothing to be done. Come to me on Thursday, and we will go to the
House together."
On the Wednesday Phineas was engaged to dine with Mr. Low. There
was a dinner party in Bedford Square, and Phineas met half-a-dozen
barristers and their wives,--men to whom he had looked up as
successful pundits in the law some five or six years ago, but who
since that time had almost learned to look up to him. And now they
treated him with that courteousness of manner which success in life
always begets. There was a judge there who was very civil to him; and
the judge's wife whom he had taken down to dinner was very gracious
to him. The judge had got his prize in life, and was therefore
personally indifferent to the fate of ministers; but the judge's wife
had a brother who wanted a County Court from Lord De Terrier, and it
was known that Phineas was giving valuable assistance towards the
attainment of this object. "I do think that you and Mr. Monk are so
right," said the judge's wife. Phineas, who understood how it came to
pass that the judge's wife should so cordially approve his conduct,
could not help thinking how grand a thing it would be for him to have
a County Court for himself.
When the guests were gone he was left alone with Mr. and Mrs. Low,
and remained awhile with them, there having been an understanding
that they should have a last chat together over the affairs of our
hero. "Do you really mean that you will not stand again?" asked Mrs.
Low.
"I do mean it. I may say that I cannot do so. My father is hardly
so well able to help me as he was when I began this game, and I
certainly shall not ask him for money to support a canvass."
"It's a thousand pities," said Mrs. Low.
"I really had begun to think that you would make it answer," said Mr.
Low.
"In one way I have made it answer. For the last three years I have
lived upon what I have earned, and I am not in debt. But now I must
begin the world again. I am afraid I shall find the drudgery very
hard."
"It is hard no doubt," said the barrister, who had gone through it
all, and was now reaping the fruits of it. "But I suppose you have
not forgotten what you learned?"
"Who can say? I dare say I have. But I did not mean the drudgery
of learning, so much as the drudgery of looking after work;--of
expecting briefs which perhaps will never come. I am thirty years old
now, you know."
"Are you indeed?" said Mrs. Low,--who knew his age to a day. "How the
time passes. I'm sure I hope you'll get on, Mr. Finn. I do indeed."
"I am sure he will, if he puts his shoulder to it," said Mr. Low.
Neither the lawyer nor his wife repeated any of those sententious
admonitions, which had almost become rebukes, and which had been
so common in their mouths. The fall with which they had threatened
Phineas Finn had come upon him, and they were too generous to remind
him of their wisdom and sagacity. Indeed, when he got up to take his
leave, Mrs. Low, who probably might not see him again for years, was
quite affectionate in her manners to him, and looked as if she were
almost minded to kiss him as she pressed his hand. "We will come and
see you," she said, "when you are Master of the Rolls in Dublin."
"We shall see him before then thundering at us poor Tories in the
House," said Mr. Low. "He will be back again sooner or later." And
so they parted.
CHAPTER LXXV
P. P. C.
On the Thursday morning before Phineas went to Mr. Monk, a gentleman
called upon him at his lodgings. Phineas requested the servant to
bring up the gentleman's name, but tempted perhaps by a shilling the
girl brought up the gentleman instead. It was Mr. Quintus Slide from
the office of the "Banner of the People."
"Mr. Finn," said Quintus, with his hand extended, "I have come to
offer you the calumet of peace." Phineas certainly desired no such
calumet. But to refuse a man's hand is to declare active war after a
fashion which men do not like to adopt except on deliberation. He had
never cared a straw for the abuse which Mr. Slide had poured upon
him, and now he gave his hand to the man of letters. But he did not
sit down, nor did he offer a seat to Mr. Slide. "I know that as a man
of sense who knows the world, you will accept the calumet of peace,"
continued Mr. Slide.
"I don't know why I should be asked particularly to accept war or
peace," said Phineas.
"Well, Mr. Finn,--I don't often quote the Bible; but those who are
not for us must be against us. You will agree to that. Now that
you've freed yourself from the iniquities of that sink of abomination
in Downing Street, I look upon you as a man again."
"Upon my word you are very kind."
"As a man and also a brother. I suppose you know that I've got the
_Banner_ into my own 'ands now." Phineas was obliged to explain that
he had not hitherto been made acquainted with this great literary
and political secret. "Oh dear, yes, altogether so. We've got rid of
old Rusty as I used to call him. He wouldn't go the pace, and so we
stripped him. He's doing the _West of England Art Journal_ now, and
he 'angs out down at Bristol."
"I hope he'll succeed, Mr. Slide."
"He'll earn his wages. He's a man who will always earn his wages, but
nothing more. Well, now, Mr. Finn, I will just offer you one word of
apology for our little severities."
"Pray do nothing of the kind."
"Indeed I shall. Dooty is dooty. There was some things printed which
were a little rough, but if one isn't a little rough there ain't no
flavour. Of course I wrote 'em. You know my 'and, I dare say."
"I only remember that there was some throwing of mud."
"Just so. But mud don't break any bones; does it? When you turned
against us I had to be down on you, and I was down upon you;--that's
just about all of it. Now you're coming among us again, and so I come
to you with a calumet of peace."
"But I am not coming among you."
"Yes you are, Finn, and bringing Monk with you." It was now becoming
very disagreeable, and Phineas was beginning to perceive that it
would soon be his turn to say something rough. "Now I'll tell you
what my proposition is. If you'll do us two leaders a week through
the session, you shall have a cheque for £16 on the last day of every
month. If that's not honester money than what you got in Downing
Street, my name is not Quintus Slide."
"Mr. Slide," said Phineas,--and then he paused.
"If we are to come to business, drop the Mister. It makes things go
so much easier."
"We are not to come to business, and I do not want things to go easy.
I believe you said some things of me in your newspaper that were very
scurrilous."
"What of that? If you mind that sort of thing--"
"I did not regard it in the least. You are quite welcome to continue
it. I don't doubt but you will continue it. But you are not welcome
to come here afterwards."
"Do you mean to turn me out?"
"Just that. You printed a heap of lies--"
"Lies, Mr. Finn! Did you say lies, sir?"
"I said lies;--lies;--lies!" And Phineas walked over at him as though
he were going to pitch him instantly out of the window. "You may go
and write as many more as you like. It is your trade, and you must do
it or starve. But do not come to me again." Then he opened the door
and stood with it in his hand.
"Very well, sir. I shall know how to punish this."
"Exactly. But if you please you'll go and do your punishment at the
office of the _Banner_,--unless you like to try it here. You want to
kick me and spit at me, but you will prefer to do it in print."
"Yes, sir," said Quintus Slide. "I shall prefer to do it in
print,--though I must own that the temptation to adopt the manual
violence of a ruffian is great, very great, very great indeed." But
he resisted the temptation and walked down the stairs, concocting his
article as he went.
Mr. Quintus Slide did not so much impede the business of his day but
what Phineas was with Mr. Monk by two, and in his place in the House
when prayers were read at four. As he sat in his place, conscious
of the work that was before him, listening to the presentation of
petitions, and to the formal reading of certain notices of motions,
which with the asking of sundry questions occupied over half an
hour, he looked back and remembered accurately his own feelings on
a certain night on which he had intended to get up and address the
House. The ordeal before him had then been so terrible, that it had
almost obliterated for the moment his senses of hearing and of sight.
He had hardly been able to perceive what had been going on around
him, and had vainly endeavoured to occupy himself in recalling to
his memory the words which he wished to pronounce. When the time for
pronouncing them had come, he had found himself unable to stand upon
his legs. He smiled as he recalled all this in his memory, waiting
impatiently for the moment in which he might rise. His audience was
assured to him now, and he did not fear it. His opportunity for
utterance was his own, and even the Speaker could not deprive him of
it. During these minutes he thought not at all of the words that he
was to say. He had prepared his matter but had prepared no words. He
knew that words would come readily enough to him, and that he had
learned the task of turning his thoughts quickly into language while
standing with a crowd of listeners around him,--as a practised writer
does when seated in his chair. There was no violent beating at his
heart now, no dimness of the eyes, no feeling that the ground was
turning round under his feet. If only those weary vain questions
would get themselves all asked, so that he might rise and begin the
work of the night. Then there came the last thought as the House was
hushed for his rising. What was the good of it all, when he would
never have an opportunity of speaking there again?
But not on that account would he be slack in his endeavour now.
He would be listened to once at least, not as a subaltern of the
Government but as the owner of a voice prominent in opposition to
the Government. He had been taught by Mr. Monk that that was the one
place in the House in which a man with a power of speaking could
really enjoy pleasure without alloy. He would make the trial,--once,
if never again. Things had so gone with him that the rostrum was his
own, and a House crammed to overflowing was there to listen to him.
He had given up his place in order that he might be able to speak his
mind, and had become aware that many intended to listen to him while
he spoke. He had observed that the rows of strangers were thick in
the galleries, that peers were standing in the passages, and that
over the reporter's head, the ribbons of many ladies were to be seen
through the bars of their cage. Yes;--for this once he would have an
audience.
He spoke for about an hour, and while he was speaking he knew nothing
about himself, whether he was doing it well or ill. Something of
himself he did say soon after he had commenced,--not quite beginning
with it, as though his mind had been laden with the matter. He had,
he said, found himself compelled to renounce his happy allegiance to
the First Lord of the Treasury, and to quit the pleasant company in
which, humble as had been his place, he had been allowed to sit and
act, by his unfortunate conviction in this great subject. He had been
told, he said, that it was a misfortune in itself for one so young as
he to have convictions. But his Irish birth and Irish connection had
brought this misfortune of his country so closely home to him that he
had found the task of extricating himself from it to be impossible.
Of what further he said, speaking on that terribly unintelligible
subject, a tenant-right proposed for Irish farmers, no English reader
will desire to know much. Irish subjects in the House of Commons
are interesting or are dull, are debated before a crowded audience
composed of all who are leaders in the great world of London, or
before empty benches, in accordance with the importance of the moment
and the character of the debate. For us now it is enough to know that
to our hero was accorded that attention which orators love,--which
will almost make an orator if it can be assured. A full House with a
promise of big type on the next morning would wake to eloquence the
propounder of a Canadian grievance, or the mover of an Indian budget.
Phineas did not stir out of the House till the division was over,
having agreed with Mr. Monk that they two would remain through it
all and hear everything that was to be said. Mr. Gresham had already
spoken, and to Mr. Palliser was confided the task of winding up
the argument for the Government. Mr. Robson spoke also, greatly
enlivening the tedium of the evening, and to Mr. Monk was permitted
the privilege of a final reply. At two o'clock the division came, and
the Ministry were beaten by a majority of twenty-three. "And now,"
said Mr. Monk, as he again walked home with Phineas, "the pity is
that we are not a bit nearer tenant-right than we were before."
"But we are nearer to it."
"In one sense, yes. Such a debate and such a majority will make men
think. But no;--think is too high a word; as a rule men don't think.
But it will make them believe that there is something in it. Many who
before regarded legislation on the subject as chimerical, will now
fancy that it is only dangerous, or perhaps not more than difficult.
And so in time it will come to be looked on as among the things
possible, then among the things probable;--and so at last it will be
ranged in the list of those few measures which the country requires
as being absolutely needed. That is the way in which public opinion
is made."
"It is no loss of time," said Phineas, "to have taken the first great
step in making it."
"The first great step was taken long ago," said Mr. Monk,--"taken
by men who were looked upon as revolutionary demagogues, almost as
traitors, because they took it. But it is a great thing to take any
step that leads us onwards."
Two days after this Mr. Gresham declared his intention of dissolving
the House because of the adverse division which had been produced by
Mr. Monk's motion, but expressed a wish to be allowed to carry an
Irish Reform Bill through Parliament before he did so. He explained
how expedient this would be, but declared at the same time that if
any strong opposition were made, he would abandon the project. His
intention simply was to pass with regard to Ireland a measure which
must be passed soon, and which ought to be passed before a new
election took place. The bill was ready, and should be read for the
first time on the next night, if the House were willing. The House
was willing, though there were very many recalcitrant Irish members.
The Irish members made loud opposition, and then twitted Mr. Gresham
with his promise that he would not go on with his bill, if opposition
were made. But, nevertheless, he did go on, and the measure was
hurried through the two Houses in a week. Our hero who still sat for
Loughshane, but who was never to sit for Loughshane again, gave what
assistance he could to the Government, and voted for the measure
which deprived Loughshane for ever of its parliamentary honours.
"And very dirty conduct I think it was," said Lord Tulla, when he
discussed the subject with his agent. "After being put in for the
borough twice, almost free of expense, it was very dirty." It never
occurred to Lord Tulla that a member of Parliament might feel himself
obliged to vote on such a subject in accordance with his judgment.
This Irish Reform Bill was scrambled through the two Houses, and
then the session was over. The session was over, and they who knew
anything of the private concerns of Mr. Phineas Finn were aware that
he was about to return to Ireland, and did not intend to reappear on
the scene which had known him so well for the last five years. "I
cannot tell you how sad it makes me," said Mr. Monk.
"And it makes me sad too," said Phineas. "I try to shake off the
melancholy, and tell myself from day to day that it is unmanly. But
it gets the better of me just at present."
"I feel quite certain that you will come back among us again," said
Mr. Monk.
"Everybody tells me so; and yet I feel quite certain that I shall
never come back,--never come back with a seat in Parliament. As my
old tutor, Low, has told me scores of times, I began at the wrong
end. Here I am, thirty years of age, and I have not a shilling in the
world, and I do not know how to earn one."
"Only for me you would still be receiving ever so much a year, and
all would be pleasant," said Mr. Monk.
"But how long would it have lasted? The first moment that Daubeny got
the upper hand I should have fallen lower than I have fallen now. If
not this year, it would have been the next. My only comfort is in
this,--that I have done the thing myself, and have not been turned
out." To the very last, however, Mr. Monk continued to express his
opinion that Phineas would come back, declaring that he had known no
instance of a young man who had made himself useful in Parliament,
and then had been allowed to leave it in early life.
Among those of whom he was bound to take a special leave, the members
of the family of Lord Brentford were, of course, the foremost. He
had already heard of the reconciliation of Miss Effingham and Lord
Chiltern, and was anxious to offer his congratulation to both of
them. And it was essential to him that he should see Lady Laura. To
her he wrote a line, saying how much he hoped that he should be able
to bid her adieu, and a time was fixed for his coming at which she
knew that she would meet him alone. But, as chance ruled it, he came
upon the two lovers together, and then remembered that he had hardly
ever before been in the same room with both of them at the same time.
"Oh, Mr. Finn, what a beautiful speech you made. I read every word of
it," said Violet.
"And I didn't even look at it, old fellow," said Chiltern, getting up
and putting his arm on the other's shoulder in a way that was common
with him when he was quite intimate with the friend near him.
"Laura went down and heard it," said Violet. "I could not do that,
because I was tied to my aunt. You can't conceive how dutiful I am
during this last month."
"And is it to be in a month, Chiltern?" said Phineas.
"She says so. She arranges everything,--in concert with my father.
When I threw up the sponge, I simply asked for a long day. 'A long
day, my lord,' I said. But my father and Violet between them refused
me any mercy."
"You do not believe him," said Violet.
"Not a word. If I did he would want to see me on the coast of
Flanders again, I don't doubt. I have come to congratulate you both."
"Thank you, Mr. Finn," said Violet, taking his hand with hearty
kindness. "I should not have been quite happy without one nice word
from you."
"I shall try and make the best of it," said Chiltern. "But, I say,
you'll come over and ride Bonebreaker again. He's down there at
the Bull, and I've taken a little box close by. I can't stand the
governor's county for hunting."
"And will your wife go down to Willingford?"
"Of course she will, and ride to hounds a great deal closer than I
can ever do. Mind you come, and if there's anything in the stable fit
to carry you, you shall have it."
Then Phineas had to explain that he had come to bid them farewell,
and that it was not at all probable that he should ever be able to
see Willingford again in the hunting season. "I don't suppose that I
shall make either of you quite understand it, but I have got to begin
again. The chances are that I shall never see another foxhound all my
life."
"Not in Ireland!" exclaimed Lord Chiltern.
"Not unless I should have to examine one as a witness. I have nothing
before me but downright hard work; and a great deal of that must be
done before I can hope to earn a shilling."
"But you are so clever," said Violet. "Of course it will come
quickly."
"I do not mean to be impatient about it, nor yet unhappy," said
Phineas. "Only hunting won't be much in my line."
"And will you leave London altogether?" Violet asked.
"Altogether. I shall stick to one club,--Brooks's; but I shall take
my name off all the others."
"What a deuce of a nuisance!" said Lord Chiltern.
"I have no doubt you will be very happy," said Violet; "and you'll be
a Lord Chancellor in no time. But you won't go quite yet."
"Next Sunday."
"You will return. You must be here for our wedding;--indeed you must.
I will not be married unless you do."
Even this, however, was impossible. He must go on Sunday, and must
return no more. Then he made his little farewell speech, which he
could not deliver without some awkward stuttering. He would think of
her on the day of her marriage, and pray that she might be happy. And
he would send her a little trifle before he went, which he hoped she
would wear in remembrance of their old friendship.
"She shall wear it, whatever it is, or I'll know the reason why,"
said Chiltern.
"Hold your tongue, you rough bear!" said Violet. "Of course I'll
wear it. And of course I'll think of the giver. I shall have many
presents, but few that I will think of so much." Then Phineas left
the room, with his throat so full that he could not speak another
word.
"He is still broken-hearted about you," said the favoured lover as
soon as his rival had left the room.
"It is not that," said Violet. "He is broken-hearted about
everything. The whole world is vanishing away from him. I wish he
could have made up his mind to marry that German woman with all the
money." It must be understood, however, that Phineas had never spoken
a word to any one as to the offer which the German woman had made to
him.
It was on the morning of the Sunday on which he was to leave London
that he saw Lady Laura. He had asked that it might be so, in order
that he might then have nothing more upon his mind. He found her
quite alone, and he could see by her eyes that she had been weeping.
As he looked at her, remembering that it was not yet six years since
he had first been allowed to enter that room, he could not but
perceive how very much she was altered in appearance. Then she had
been three-and-twenty, and had not looked to be a day older. Now she
might have been taken to be nearly forty, so much had her troubles
preyed upon her spirit, and eaten into the vitality of her youth. "So
you have come to say good-bye," she said, smiling as she rose to meet
him.
"Yes, Lady Laura;--to say good-bye. Not for ever, I hope, but
probably for long."
"No, not for ever. At any rate, we will not think so." Then she
paused; but he was silent, sitting with his hat dangling in his two
hands, and his eyes fixed upon the floor. "Do you know, Mr. Finn,"
she continued, "that sometimes I am very angry with myself about
you."
"Then it must be because you have been too kind to me."
"It is because I fear that I have done much to injure you. From
the first day that I knew you,--do you remember, when we were
talking here, in this very room, about the beginning of the Reform
Bill;--from that day I wished that you should come among us and be
one of us."
"I have been with you, to my infinite satisfaction,--while it
lasted."
"But it has not lasted, and now I fear that it has done you harm."
"Who can say whether it has been for good or evil? But of this I am
sure you will be certain,--that I am very grateful to you for all the
goodness you have shown me." Then again he was silent.
She did not know what it was that she wanted, but she did desire some
expression from his lips that should be warmer than an expression of
gratitude. An expression of love,--of existing love,--she would have
felt to be an insult, and would have treated it as such. Indeed, she
knew that from him no such insult could come. But she was in that
morbid, melancholy state of mind which requires the excitement
of more than ordinary sympathy, even though that sympathy be all
painful; and I think that she would have been pleased had he referred
to the passion for herself which he had once expressed. If he would
have spoken of his love, and of her mistake, and have made some
half-suggestion as to what might have been their lives had things
gone differently,--though she would have rebuked him even for
that,--still it would have comforted her. But at this moment, though
he remembered much that had passed between them, he was not even
thinking of the Braes of Linter. All that had taken place four years
ago;--and there had been so many other things since which had moved
him even more than that! "You have heard what I have arranged for
myself?" she said at last.
"Your father has told me that you are going to Dresden."
"Yes;--he will accompany me,--coming home of course for Parliament.
It is a sad break-up, is it not? But the lawyer says that if I remain
here I may be subject to very disagreeable attempts from Mr. Kennedy
to force me to go back again. It is odd, is it not, that he should
not understand how impossible it is?"
"He means to do his duty."
"I believe so. But he becomes more stern every day to those who are
with him. And then, why should I remain here? What is there to tempt
me? As a woman separated from her husband I cannot take an interest
in those things which used to charm me. I feel that I am crushed and
quelled by my position, even though there is no disgrace in it."
"No disgrace, certainly," said Phineas.
"But I am nobody,--or worse than nobody."
"And I also am going to be a nobody," said Phineas, laughing.
"Ah; you are a man and will get over it, and you have many years
before you will begin to be growing old. I am growing old already.
Yes, I am. I feel it, and know it, and see it. A woman has a fine
game to play; but then she is so easily bowled out, and the term
allowed to her is so short."
"A man's allowance of time may be short too," said Phineas.
"But he can try his hand again." Then there was another pause. "I had
thought, Mr. Finn, that you would have married," she said in her very
lowest voice.
"You knew all my hopes and fears about that."
"I mean that you would have married Madame Goesler."
"What made you think that, Lady Laura?"
"Because I saw that she liked you, and because such a marriage would
have been so suitable. She has all that you want. You know what they
say of her now?"
"What do they say?"
"That the Duke of Omnium offered to make her his wife, and that she
refused him for your sake."
"There is nothing that people won't say;--nothing on earth," said
Phineas. Then he got up and took his leave of her. He also wanted to
part from her with some special expression of affection, but he did
not know how to choose his words. He had wished that some allusion
should be made, not to the Braes of Linter, but to the close
confidence which had so long existed between them; but he found
that the language to do this properly was wanting to him. Had the
opportunity arisen he would have told her now the whole story of
Mary Flood Jones; but the opportunity did not come, and he left her,
never having mentioned the name of his Mary or having hinted at his
engagement to any one of his friends in London. "It is better so,"
he said to himself. "My life in Ireland is to be a new life, and why
should I mix two things together that will be so different?"
He was to dine at his lodgings, and then leave them for good at
eight o'clock. He had packed up everything before he went to Portman
Square, and he returned home only just in time to sit down to his
solitary mutton chop. But as he sat down he saw a small note
addressed to himself lying on the table among the crowd of books,
letters, and papers, of which he had still to make disposal. It was
a very small note in an envelope of a peculiar tint of pink, and he
knew the handwriting well. The blood mounted all over his face as he
took it up, and he hesitated for a moment before he opened it. It
could not be that the offer should be repeated to him. Slowly, hardly
venturing at first to look at the enclosure, he opened it, and the
words which it contained were as follows:--
I learn that you are going to-day, and I write a word
which you will receive just as you are departing. It is to
say merely this,--that when I left you the other day I was
angry, not with you, but with myself. Let me wish you all
good wishes and that prosperity which I know you will
deserve, and which I think you will win.
Yours very truly,
M. M. G.
Sunday morning.
Should he put off his journey and go to her this very evening and
claim her as his friend? The question was asked and answered in a
moment. Of course he would not go to her. Were he to do so there
would be only one possible word for him to say, and that word should
certainly never be spoken. But he wrote to her a reply, shorter even
than her own short note.
Thanks, dear friend. I do not doubt but that you and I
understand each other thoroughly, and that each trusts the
other for good wishes and honest intentions.
Always yours,
P. F.
I write these as I am starting.
When he had written this, he kept it till the last moment in his
hand, thinking that he would not send it. But as he slipped into the
cab, he gave the note to his late landlady to post.
At the station Bunce came to him to say a word of farewell, and Mrs.
Bunce was on his arm.
"Well done, Mr. Finn, well done," said Bunce. "I always knew there
was a good drop in you."
"You always told me I should ruin myself in Parliament, and so I
have," said Phineas.
"Not at all. It takes a deal to ruin a man if he's got the right
sperrit. I've better hopes of you now than ever I had in the old
days when you used to be looking out for Government place;--and Mr.
Monk has tried that too. I thought he would find the iron too heavy
for him." "God bless you, Mr. Finn," said Mrs. Bunce with her
handkerchief up to her eyes. "There's not one of 'em I ever had as
lodgers I've cared about half as much as I did for you." Then they
shook hands with him through the window, and the train was off.
CHAPTER LXXVI
Conclusion
We are told that it is a bitter moment with the Lord Mayor when he
leaves the Mansion House and becomes once more Alderman Jones, of No.
75, Bucklersbury. Lord Chancellors going out of office have a great
fall though they take pensions with them for their consolation. And
the President of the United States when he leaves the glory of the
White House and once more becomes a simple citizen must feel the
change severely. But our hero, Phineas Finn, as he turned his back
upon the scene of his many successes, and prepared himself for
permanent residence in his own country, was, I think, in a worse
plight than any of the reduced divinities to whom I have alluded.
They at any rate had known that their fall would come. He, like
Icarus, had flown up towards the sun, hoping that his wings of wax
would bear him steadily aloft among the gods. Seeing that his wings
were wings of wax, we must acknowledge that they were very good. But
the celestial lights had been too strong for them, and now, having
lived for five years with lords and countesses, with Ministers and
orators, with beautiful women and men of fashion, he must start again
in a little lodging in Dublin, and hope that the attorneys of that
litigious city might be good to him. On his journey home he made but
one resolution. He would make the change, or attempt to make it,
with manly strength. During his last month in London he had allowed
himself to be sad, depressed, and melancholy. There should be an end
of all that now. Nobody at home should see that he was depressed.
And Mary, his own Mary, should at any rate have no cause to think
that her love and his own engagement had ever been the cause to him
of depression. Did he not value her love more than anything in the
world? A thousand times he told himself that he did.
She was there in the old house at Killaloe to greet him. Her
engagement was an affair known to all the county, and she had no
idea that it would become her to be coy in her love. She was in his
arms before he had spoken to his father and mother, and had made her
little speech to him,--very inaudibly indeed,--while he was covering
her sweet face with kisses. "Oh, Phineas, I am so proud of you; and
I think you are so right, and I am so glad you have done it." Again
he covered her face with kisses. Could he ever have had such
satisfaction as this had he allowed Madame Goesler's hand to remain
in his?
On the first night of his arrival he sat for an hour downstairs
with his father talking over his plans. He felt,--he could not but
feel,--that he was not the hero now that he had been when he was last
at Killaloe,--when he had come thither with a Cabinet Minister under
his wing. And yet his father did his best to prevent the growth of
any such feeling. The old doctor was not quite as well off as he had
been when Phineas first started with his high hopes for London. Since
that day he had abandoned his profession and was now living on the
fruits of his life's labour. For the last two years he had been
absolved from the necessity of providing an income for his son, and
had probably allowed himself to feel that no such demand upon him
would again be made. Now, however, it was necessary that he should do
so. Could his son manage to live on two hundred a-year? There would
then be four hundred a-year left for the wants of the family at home.
Phineas swore that he could fight his battle on a hundred and fifty,
and they ended the argument by splitting the difference. He had been
paying exactly the same sum of money for the rooms he had just left
in London; but then, while he held those rooms, his income had been
two thousand a-year. Tenant-right was a very fine thing, but could it
be worth such a fall as this?
"And about dear Mary?" said the father.
"I hope it may not be very long," said Phineas.
"I have not spoken to her about it, but your mother says that Mrs.
Flood Jones is very averse to a long engagement."
"What can I do? She would not wish me to marry her daughter with no
other income than an allowance made by you."
"Your mother says that she has some idea that you and she might live
together;--that if they let Floodborough you might take a small house
in Dublin. Remember, Phineas, I am not proposing it myself."
Then Phineas bethought himself that he was not even yet so low in the
world that he need submit himself to terms dictated to him by Mrs.
Flood Jones. "I am glad that you do not propose it, sir."
"Why so, Phineas?"
"Because I should have been obliged to oppose the plan even if it had
come from you. Mothers-in-law are never a comfort in a house."
"I never tried it myself," said the doctor.
"And I never will try it. I am quite sure that Mary does not expect
any such thing, and that she is willing to wait. If I can shorten the
term of waiting by hard work, I will do so." The decision to which
Phineas had come on this matter was probably made known to Mrs. Flood
Jones after some mild fashion by old Mrs. Finn. Nothing more was
said to Phineas about a joint household; but he was quite able to
perceive from the manner of the lady towards him that his proposed
mother-in-law wished him to understand that he was treating her
daughter very badly. What did it signify? None of them knew the story
of Madame Goesler, and of course none of them would know it. None of
them would ever hear how well he had behaved to his little Mary.
But Mary did know it all before he left her to go up to Dublin. The
two lovers allowed themselves,--or were allowed by their elders, one
week of exquisite bliss together; and during this week, Phineas told
her, I think, everything. He told her everything as far as he could
do so without seeming to boast of his own successes. How is a man
not to tell such tales when he has on his arm, close to him, a girl
who tells him her little everything of life, and only asks for his
confidence in return? And then his secrets are so precious to her and
so sacred, that he feels as sure of her fidelity as though she were
a very goddess of faith and trust. And the temptation to tell is so
great. For all that he has to tell she loves him the better and still
the better. A man desires to win a virgin heart, and is happy to
know,--or at least to believe,--that he has won it. With a woman
every former rival is an added victim to the wheels of the triumphant
chariot in which she is sitting. "All these has he known and loved,
culling sweets from each of them. But now he has come to me, and I am
the sweetest of them all." And so Mary was taught to believe of Laura
and of Violet and of Madame Goesler,--that though they had had charms
to please, her lover had never been so charmed as he was now while
she was hanging to his breast. And I think that she was right in her
belief. During those lovely summer evening walks along the shores of
Lough Derg, Phineas was as happy as he had ever been at any moment of
his life.
"I shall never be impatient,--never," she said to him on the last
evening. "All I want is that you should write to me."
"I shall want more than that, Mary."
"Then you must come down and see me. When you do come they will be
happy, happy days for me. But of course we cannot be married for the
next twenty years."
"Say forty, Mary."
"I will say anything that you like;--you will know what I mean just
as well. And, Phineas, I must tell you one thing,--though it makes me
sad to think of it, and will make me sad to speak of it."
"I will not have you sad on our last night, Mary."
"I must say it. I am beginning to understand how much you have given
up for me."
"I have given up nothing for you."
"If I had not been at Killaloe when Mr. Monk was here, and if we had
not,--had not,--oh dear, if I had not loved you so very much, you
might have remained in London, and that lady would have been your
wife."
"Never!" said Phineas stoutly.
"Would she not? She must not be your wife now, Phineas. I am not
going to pretend that I will give you up."
"That is unkind, Mary."
"Oh, well; you may say what you please. If that is unkind, I am
unkind. It would kill me to lose you."
Had he done right? How could there be a doubt about it? How could
there be a question about it? Which of them had loved him, or was
capable of loving him as Mary loved him? What girl was ever so sweet,
so gracious, so angelic, as his own Mary? He swore to her that he was
prouder of winning her than of anything he had ever done in all his
life, and that of all the treasures that had ever come in his way she
was the most precious. She went to bed that night the happiest girl
in all Connaught, although when she parted from him she understood
that she was not to see him again till Christmas-Eve.
But she did see him again before the summer was over, and the manner
of their meeting was in this wise. Immediately after the passing of
that scrambled Irish Reform Bill, Parliament, as the reader knows,
was dissolved. This was in the early days of June, and before the end
of July the new members were again assembled at Westminster. This
session, late in summer, was very terrible; but it was not very long,
and then it was essentially necessary. There was something of the
year's business which must yet be done, and the country would require
to know who were to be the Ministers of the Government. It is not
needed that the reader should be troubled any further with the
strategy of one political leader or of another, or that more should
be said of Mr. Monk and his tenant-right. The House of Commons had
offended Mr. Gresham by voting in a majority against him, and Mr.
Gresham had punished the House of Commons by subjecting it to the
expense and nuisance of a new election. All this is constitutional,
and rational enough to Englishmen, though it may be unintelligible to
strangers. The upshot on the present occasion was that the Ministers
remained in their places and that Mr. Monk's bill, though it had
received the substantial honour of a second reading, passed away for
the present into the limbo of abortive legislation.
All this would not concern us at all, nor our poor hero much, were
it not that the great men with whom he had been for two years so
pleasant a colleague, remembered him with something of affectionate
regret. Whether it began with Mr. Gresham or with Lord Cantrip, I
will not say;--or whether Mr. Monk, though now a political enemy,
may have said a word that brought about the good deed. Be that as it
may, just before the summer session was brought to a close Phineas
received the following letter from Lord Cantrip:--
Downing Street, August 4, 186--.
MY DEAR MR. FINN,--
Mr. Gresham has been talking to me, and we both think
that possibly a permanent Government appointment may be
acceptable to you. We have no doubt, that should this be
the case, your services would be very valuable to the
country. There is a vacancy for a poor-law inspector at
present in Ireland, whose residence I believe should be
in Cork. The salary is a thousand a-year. Should the
appointment suit you, Mr. Gresham will be most happy to
nominate you to the office. Let me have a line at your
early convenience.
Believe me,
Most sincerely yours,
CANTRIP.
He received the letter one morning in Dublin, and within three hours
he was on his route to Killaloe. Of course he would accept the
appointment, but he would not even do that without telling Mary of
his new prospect. Of course he would accept the appointment. Though
he had been as yet barely two months in Dublin, though he had hardly
been long enough settled to his work to have hoped to be able to see
in which way there might be a vista open leading to success, still he
had fancied that he had seen that success was impossible. He did not
know how to begin,--and men were afraid of him, thinking that he was
unsteady, arrogant, and prone to failure. He had not seen his way to
the possibility of a guinea.
"A thousand a-year!" said Mary Flood Jones, opening her eyes wide
with wonder at the golden future before them.
"It is nothing very great for a perpetuity," said Phineas.
"Oh, Phineas; surely a thousand a-year will be very nice."
"It will be certain," said Phineas, "and then we can be married
to-morrow."
"But I have been making up my mind to wait ever so long," said Mary.
"Then your mind must be unmade," said Phineas.
What was the nature of the reply to Lord Cantrip the reader may
imagine, and thus we will leave our hero an Inspector of Poor Houses
in the County of Cork.
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