Phineas Finn Part 91

"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 b.r.e.a.s.t.s 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 circ.u.mstances 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?"