Scarlet and Hyssop Part 27

CHAPTER XIV

The General Election had been definitely fixed to begin in the second week in July, and consequently soon after Ascot politicians of all sorts and shades of opinion were sedulously flying about the country, busy recounting to the wondering provinces how grossly their opponents had misrepresented their aims and tactics, and proving in an array of terms which beggared the dictionary, that the country could only be saved by the united voice of the people declaring that they would record a firm and combined vote. South Africa was, of course, the chosen battlefield of both parties; here each was determined to fight the matter out (this was the only matter on which they were agreed), and the speed with which the opposing armies mobilized out there was as remarkable as their manoeuvres when arrived. Some charged through the country already peopled in their minds with the families of reservists, and dotted with happy homesteads, over which waved the fair golden corn, while on the hills of the Wit.w.a.tersrand the great mills poured out their millions, and those who had been in arms were already spending happy Sunday evenings with their brother Boers, singing hymns to the accompaniment of the vrow's harmonium, and zealously marrying her buxom daughters. Gold paved the streets of Johannesburg, and the curbstones thereof were diamonds, and Paul Kruger and Mr. Leyds fell on their bended knees and, with tears of grat.i.tude in their grateful eyes, blessed the names of Mr.

Rhodes and the Colonial Secretary. The Union Jack waved on all the winds of heaven, and every Englishman in that happy land beat his rifle into a pea-shooter for his infant children--half Boer, half British--and ate his roast beef under his fig-tree.

But oddly enough exactly the same data furnished the Opposition with a picture by no means identical. These gentlemen went mournfully through the land, which was, it appeared, a desert. Cemeteries and ruined homesteads were the only features that they, for their part, could discern in that desolate landscape, and the cemeteries, they sadly declared, marked, not only the graves of the young British soldier, martyred to gorge the capitalist with gold, but were, to the thoughtful eye, none else than the place where the British Empire died and was buried. Along the ridge of the Wit.w.a.tersrand rose the gra.s.s-grown engines of the mines; the rusty fly-wheels hung cableless in that miasmic air, tainted with rotting corpses. No sound was heard, no sign of life was visible; only from time to time there came from the bowels of the earth the sobbing of those who had once been gorged capitalists.

The country was drained of its resources, sir--emptied of its inhabitants. That garden of the Lord was barren and desolate. Who, they asked, with rising pa.s.sion, had done this? The late Government. Why had they done this? Because they were under the thumb of the capitalists.

They had piles and ma.s.ses of doc.u.mentary evidence to prove every word they said. And awe fell on the a.s.semblies.

After this first plain statement of the case delivered in duet by the leader of the Government and the leader of the Opposition, there followed what may be described as a fugual chorus. Everybody else, that is to say, joined in and shouted the same thing over and over again at the top of his voice. There were two conductors, no other than the executants of the opening duet, who, standing back to back, beat away at the chorus for all they were worth, and in the more delirious moments turned round and hit savagely at each other with their batons. The audience comprised nearly all the inhabitants of the round world, and this remarkable chorus lasted day and night without intermission for three weeks. Then they all sang "Britons never, never, never will be slaves," but with totally different expression, and meaning utterly different things, so that the effect of unanimity, which otherwise would no doubt have been extremely striking, was spoiled, and rude things were said in the French journals. That, it is true, for a moment produced a defensive alliance among themselves, and they roared out across the Channel. "How about Dreyfus?" But almost immediately the more ardent spirits--sober politicians they called themselves--began again, and mixed with the renewed chorus-singing were bonfires and other things, and most prominent people were burned in effigy and appeared not to mind it.

Then, when every one was exhausted and out of breath, they put on their coats again, and sat down for a while to see what the result had been.

Europe generally was smiling, and went on much as usual; but in England itself it appeared that certain groups of people were not listening to the beautiful music at all, but puzzling and frowning over some papers of statistics. Also it was observed that some men, who ought to have been singing as hard as anybody, were not singing at all, but talking quietly to those portions of the audience who were willing to listen. Of these, two were immediately concerned with this story, and these were Lord Alston and Jim Spencer. And, although they belonged to opposite parties, they were both saying precisely the same thing.

This particular evening Jack had returned to London somewhat unexpectedly, having found himself able to catch a late train up, after the meeting he had been addressing in Southampton on behalf of a young Conservative, standing for the first time, who, because he had been nearly all the way to Pretoria, was therefore apparently qualified to say the last word on every measure, from seats for shop girls to seats for Bishops in the Upper House. Marie had just come home from a party when he arrived, and the two talked while Jack had supper.

"I don't suppose I shouted and screamed enough to please him," he said; "but the fact is, I do not think he is necessarily omniscient, nor that he will be Prime Minister at the age of twenty-four. However, I preached the gospel."

Marie threw back her cloak.

"Talk to me while you eat," she said. "I am getting swept into the vortex, too; this evening we talked about nothing but politics."

"Won't it bore you?"

"I shall enjoy it. I think people believe in you, Jack."

Jack shrugged his shoulders.

"The point is that they should believe what I say. It doesn't matter about me."

"Indeed it does. It is you who make them believe it. Besides--well, go on."

"Well, I told them that I thought both Conservatives and Liberals were doing quite wrong in making the South African affair, except in so far as it was a test of our efficiency, the cry of the election. It has been the fas.h.i.+on to speak of it as a great war. It is nothing of the kind, though it is perfectly true that, owing to our own hopeless mistakes, we brought it very near to being a most disastrous war, if not a war fatal to the Empire. Young Campbell's face fell rapidly as I spoke."

"I can imagine that," said Marie.

"The audience were not too pleased, either; but somehow, Marie, and for the first time, I did not care a rap. You have often told me that I speak without conviction. It is quite true; I believe what I say without feeling it. But to-night I felt it, and I knew I could make them feel it. I had them in my hand, and at first I carefully rubbed them up the wrong way. I went through the disasters of December, 1899--Stormberg, Magersfontein, Colenso. I pointed out that most of these could have been saved, if we had only been decently prepared, instead of going into the war in a blind and idiotic manner, as if the fact of our being the British Empire made it impious and profane for any one to attempt to withstand or, even worse, check us. I touched every sore place that I could put my finger on. Once I thought I had gone too far, for a man shouted out: 'Turn the--well, horrid Radical out!' And having, as well as I could, pulled our policy to bits, I proceeded to pluck the army itself. I a.s.sure you there was hardly a feather left on it. Doesn't all this bore you?"

Jack got up, having finished his meal, and stood beside her.

"You know it doesn't," said she.

"And then quite suddenly I a.s.sured them that the Empire was far the soundest concern in the world. Well, it may seem conceited, Marie, but it is the fact, that I had them so much in hand by then that a huge sigh of relief went round the hall. I never felt so flattered. But short of that I said everything was about as wrong as it could be. What is wanted is not amiable and excellent n.o.blemen, who talk a great deal and are excessively polite, but people who just work, do things and not say them, pay no attention to party politics whatever--that can be done by the rank and file, all those who get into Parliament simply in order to talk--and buckle to, guided entirely by experts, and insist on having men and officers, mind you, properly trained, given proper guns to handle, and made to use their heads. We have, I believe, the best material in the world out of which to make the army we need. But it is raw, it is untrained; it is no more an army than sheep's wool is a coat.

And it was their first duty, I told them, to vote for the Government which they thought would best put the House in order. This was a Conservative meeting, I reminded them, but I would sooner that every man in it voted Liberal than that he should, merely because he was accustomed to call himself a Conservative, vote Conservative, if he believed that the Liberals would be more likely to put these necessary reforms into effect. Then I came down hammer and tongs with Rule, Britannia; there should be only one party in our great, our happy and glorious island, the Party of Efficiency. Efficiency is our first need.

I concluded with some amiable remarks about Campbell."

Marie got up, her eye flas.h.i.+ng.

"Well, you've done it now, Jack," she said.

"I know I have. I couldn't help it. And to-morrow I shall find out exactly what I have done."

Marie got up and walked up and down the room for a few moments without replying. Jack's highly original line of conduct for a man whose aim was to get into the Cabinet was extraordinarily attractive to her sense of picturesqueness. He had certainly played a very bold game, but she could not feel satisfied in her own mind whether he had over-stepped the dividing-line between boldness and sheer audacity.

"Also I said that, if the Conservatives got in, it was to be hoped they would clear out the old gang," remarked Jack, in parenthesis to her thoughts.

Marie frowned.

"Ah, that was not wise, was it?" she said. "Didn't it savour too much of an application for a vacant post?"

"It was meant to," said Jack. "After the rest of my speech, it could not be supposed that I hoped--as I do hope--to get the War Office by ingratiating myself with the old gang. If I get it, I shall get it because I am popularly supposed to be wanted. I do apply for the post. I gave them this afternoon my idea of my duties if I get it. But I apply to the people. Lord, what a treat the morning papers will be!"

Marie's eyes kindled again as she continued to walk up and down the dusky dining-room, her long dress whispering on the carpet.

"I am excited, exhilarated," she said. "It is like getting out of stuffy rooms into the open air to hear you talk, Jack. I can't make up my mind as to whether I think you have done altogether wisely, but you have gone on a big scale. I admire that."

Jack got up. Marie's words thrilled him with a warmth he had not felt for her for years. Already he was beginning to look on the conduct of his married life with a wonder that rose now into a disgusted incredulity. Her splendid contempt for him had begun it; he had been stung into seeing her as she was, and her generosity to him had fostered it. No after-word of reproach had pa.s.sed her lips for that which now made his ears burn to think of. She had seen with her woman's instinct his deepening contrition for that ugly scene, and, seeing it, did not need or desire a spoken a.s.surance. But what Jack did not know was that his reawakened pa.s.sion roused in her no answering spark whatever.

Pa.s.sion for him was dead in her. In a moment she went on:

"I am immensely interested in your aims, Jack, and your method of working for them. If one is not sure of one's self, tact and diplomacy help one to feel one's way; but there is a higher gift than these, and I believe you have it--it is strength."

He turned round, facing the fireplace, feeling suddenly chilled. In the hall a clock struck two, and a weary-faced footman looked suggestively in.

"Good gracious! is it already two?" she said, picking up her unopened post; "and I have not read these yet. They must wait; I know by the feel of them they are uninteresting."

She turned and faced him, standing in the full blaze of the electric light, her face brilliantly illuminated. She had thrown back her cloak, her white bosom moved slowly and gently to her breathing, and his eyes were dazzled at her incomparable beauty. And all this, the perfect bloom of womanhood, this lily in a leper settlement, had been his. Instead he had preferred outwardly the rouge and the dye, inwardly the vulgar flas.h.i.+ness and tawdry wit of her who had so long been his mistress. At the moment he felt he loathed Mildred. Once he tried to speak and could not, and she had turned again.

"Good-night, Jack," she said over her shoulder. "You must be tired. I shall be excited to see what the unofficial Government organs make of you. Will you tell them to put the lights out when you go upstairs?"

He stood where he was listening to the diminuendo whisper of her dress.

Then, after a moment, he heard the door of her bedroom shut behind her.

Quite a quant.i.ty of unknown, though probably not obscure, leader-writers bestowed their distinguished attention on Jack next day. The Daily Chronicle and Daily News announced that they had had the sagacity months before to foresee this split in the Conservative party, and hailed Jack as a prodigal son returning to the depleted homesteads of Liberalism.

The Standard, on the other hand, grabbed him as the _homme necessaire_ of the Conservative party; the Times, gently tr.i.m.m.i.n.g, admitted that to a certain extent, and subject to various conditions, there was something in what he said; the Daily Telegraph clearly did not know what to think, and fell back on generalities about 9.7 guns; while a few hours later the Westminster Gazette had a cartoon ent.i.tled "Jack the Ripper," in which he was represented with an impa.s.sive face methodically disembowelling the present Cabinet--a signpost indicated Hatfield. The effect on the press, in fact, was very satisfactory; opinions were widely divergent and extremely violent. In fact, as Jack said to Marie when he saw her next morning, he seemed to have "caught on."

"And what do you suppose they will think?" asked Marie.

"Who? Oh, they! I don't know. But I soon shall, as I'm going down to headquarters now. I think, perhaps, as the papers have taken me up, it may incline them to give me office. Not that they ever read the papers.

But office is regarded as a muzzling order, as far as I can make out.

They may think me worth muzzling. If so, I see no reason for not taking my muzzle off. I may not be back for lunch; I rather want to see Lady Ardingly."

"General bureau; central office," said she.

"Precisely. You have the habit of putting things well. Good-bye, Marie."

He bent over the low chair where she was sitting and gently kissed her on the forehead. She looked up in genuine astonishment, then flushed slightly, for they had long been strangers to that sort of spontaneous caress, and it seemed to her to come from a stranger. He saw her astonishment and winced at it. "I--I beg your pardon!" he said hurriedly, knowing the moment he spoke that he was ill-inspired.

The bewildered moment of surprise pa.s.sed, leaving Marie, however, with a glimpse of what might be even more bewildering. She laughed lightly enough, but with a certain nervousness.

"How original, for a husband to apologize to his wife for kissing her!"