Can You Forgive Her?

by Anthony Trollope

  CHAPTER LIX.

  The Duke of St. Bungay in Search of a Minister.

  It was the butler who had knocked,--showing that the knock was ofmore importance than it would have been had it been struck by theknuckles of the footman in livery. "If you please, sir, the Duke ofSt. Bungay is here."

  "The Duke of St. Bungay!" said Mr. Palliser, becoming rather red as heheard the announcement.

  "Yes, sir, his grace is in the library. He bade me tell you that heparticularly wanted to see you; so I told him that you were with mylady."

  "Quite right; tell his grace that I will be with him in two minutes."Then the butler retired, and Mr. Palliser was again alone with hiswife.

  "I must go now, my dear," he said; "and perhaps I shall not see youagain till the evening."

  "Don't let me put you out in any way," she answered.

  "Oh no;--you won't put me out. You will be dressing, I suppose, aboutnine."

  "I did not mean as to that," she answered. "You must not thinkmore of Italy. He has come to tell you that you are wanted in theCabinet."

  Again he turned very red. "It may be so," he answered, "but thoughI am wanted, I need not go. But I must not keep the duke waiting.Good-bye." And he turned to the door.

  She followed him and took hold of him as he went, so that he wasforced to turn to her once again. She managed to get hold of bothhis hands, and pressed them closely, looking up into his face withher eyes laden with tears. He smiled at her gently, returned thepressure of the hands, and then left her,--without kissing her. Itwas not that he was minded not to kiss her. He would have kissed herwillingly enough had he thought that the occasion required it. "Hesays that he loves me," said Lady Glencora to herself, "but he doesnot know what love means."

  But she was quite aware that he had behaved to her with genuine, truenobility. As soon as she was alone and certain of her solitude, shetook out that letter from her pocket, and tearing it into very smallfragments, without reading it, threw the pieces on the fire. As shedid so, her mind seemed to be fixed, at any rate, to one thing,--thatshe would think no more of Burgo Fitzgerald as her future master. Ithink, however, that she had arrived at so much certainty as this,at that moment in which she had been parting with Burgo Fitzgerald,in Lady Monk's dining-room. She had had courage enough,--or shall werather say sin enough,--to think of going with him,--to tell herselfthat she would do so; to put herself in the way of doing it; nay, shehad had enough of both to enable her to tell her husband that she hadresolved that it would be good for her to do so. But she was neitherbold enough nor wicked enough to do the thing. As she had said of herown idea of destroying herself,--she did not dare to take the plunge.Therefore, knowing now that it was so, she tore up the letter thatshe had carried so long, and burnt it in the fire.

  She had in truth told him everything, believing that in doing so shewas delivering her own death-warrant as regarded her future positionin his house. She had done this, not hoping thereby for any escape;not with any purpose as regarded herself, but simply because deceithad been grievous to her, and had become unendurable as soon ashis words and manner had in them any feeling of kindness. But herconfession had no sooner been made than her fault had been forgiven.She had told him that she did not love him. She had told him, even,that she had thought of leaving him. She had justified by her ownwords any treatment of his, however harsh, which he might chooseto practise. But the result had been--the immediate result--thathe had been more tender to her than she had ever remembered him tobe before. She knew that he had conquered her. However cold andheartless his home might be to her, it must be her home now. Therecould be no further thought of leaving him. She had gone out into thetiltyard and had tilted with him, and he had been the victor.

  Mr. Palliser himself had not time for much thought before he foundhimself closeted with the Duke; but as he crossed the hall and wentup the stairs, a thought or two did pass quickly across his mind. Shehad confessed to him, and he had forgiven her. He did not feel quitesure that he had been right, but he did feel quite sure that thething had been done. He recognized it for a fact that, as regardedthe past, no more was to be said. There were to be no reproaches,and there must be some tacit abandoning of Mrs. Marsham's closeattendance. As to Mr. Bott;--he had begun to hate Mr. Bott, and hadfelt cruelly ungrateful, when that gentleman endeavoured to whisper aword into his ear as he passed through the doorway into Lady Monk'sdining-room. And he had offered to go abroad,--to go abroad andleave his politics, and his ambition, and his coming honours. Hehad persisted in his offer, even after his wife had suggested tohim that the Duke of St. Bungay was now in the house with the objectof offering him that very thing for which he had so longed! As hethought of this his heart became heavy within him. Such chances,--sohe told himself,--do not come twice in a man's way. When returningfrom a twelvemonth's residence abroad he would be nobody in politics.He would have lost everything for which he had been working all hislife. But he was a man of his word, and as he opened the library doorhe was resolute,--he thought that he could be resolute in adhering tohis promise.

  "Duke," he said, "I'm afraid I have kept you waiting." And the twopolitical allies shook each other by the hand.

  The Duke was in a glow of delight. There had been no waiting. He wasonly too glad to find his friend at home. He had been prepared towait, even if Mr. Palliser had been out. "And I suppose you guess whyI'm come?" said the Duke.

  "I would rather be told than have to guess," said Mr. Palliser,smiling for a moment. But the smile quickly passed off his face as heremembered his pledge to his wife.

  "He has resigned at last. What was said in the Lords last night madeit necessary that he should do so, or that Lord Brock should declarehimself able to support him through thick and thin. Of course, I cantell you everything now. He must have gone, or I must have done so.You know that I don't like him in the Cabinet. I admire his characterand his genius, but I think him the most dangerous man in England asa statesman. He has high principles,--the very highest; but they areso high as to be out of sight to ordinary eyes. They are too exaltedto be of any use for everyday purposes. He is honest as the sun, I'msure; but it's just like the sun's honesty,--of a kind which we menbelow can't quite understand or appreciate. He has no instinct inpolitics, but reaches his conclusions by philosophical deduction.Now, in politics, I would a deal sooner trust to instinct than tocalculation. I think he may probably know how England ought to begoverned three centuries hence better than any man living, but of theproper way to govern it now, I think he knows less. Brock half likeshim and half fears him. He likes the support of his eloquence, and helikes the power of the man; but he fears his restless activity, andthoroughly dislikes his philosophy. At any rate, he has left us, andI am here to ask you to take his place."

  The Duke, as he concluded his speech, was quite contented, andalmost jovial. He was thoroughly satisfied with the new politicalarrangement which he was proposing. He regarded Mr. Palliser as asteady, practical man of business, luckily young, and therefore witha deal of work in him, belonging to the race from which Englishministers ought, in his opinion, to be taken, and as being, in somerespects, his own pupil. He had been the first to declare aloud thatPlantagenet Palliser was the coming Chancellor of the Exchequer; andit had been long known, though no such declaration had been madealoud, that the Duke did not sit comfortably in the same Cabinet withthe gentleman who had now resigned. Everything had now gone as theDuke wished; and he was prepared to celebrate some little ovationwith his young friend before he left the house in Park Lane.

  "And who goes out with him?" asked Mr. Palliser, putting off the evilmoment of his own decision but before the Duke could answer him, hehad reminded himself that under his present circumstances he had noright to ask such a question. His own decision could not rest uponthat point. "But it does not matter," he said; "I am afraid I mustdecline the offer you bring me."

  "Decline it!" said the Duke, who could not have been more surprisedhad his friend talked of declining heaven.

  "I f
ear I must." The Duke had now risen from his chair, and wasstanding, with both his hands upon the table. All his contentment,all his joviality, had vanished. His fine round face had becomealmost ludicrously long; his eyes and mouth were struggling to conveyreproach, and the reproach was almost drowned in vexation. Ever sinceParliament had met he had been whispering Mr. Palliser's name intothe Prime Minister's ear, and now--. But he could not, and would not,believe it. "Nonsense, Palliser," he said. "You must have got somefalse notion into your head. There can be no possible reason why youshould not join us. Finespun himself will support us, at any ratefor a time." Mr. Finespun was the gentleman whose retirement from theministry the Duke of St. Bungay had now announced.

  "It is nothing of that kind," said Mr. Palliser, who perhaps felthimself quite equal to the duties proposed to him, even though Mr.Finespun should not support him. "It is nothing of that kind;--it isno fear of that sort that hinders me."

  "Then, for mercy's sake, what is it? My dear Palliser, I looked uponyou as being as sure in this matter as myself; and I had a rightto do so. You certainly intended to join us a month ago, if theopportunity offered. You certainly did."

  "It is true, Duke. I must ask you to listen to me now, and I musttell you what I would not willingly tell to any man." As Mr. Pallisersaid this a look of agony came over his face. There are men who cantalk easily of all their most inmost matters, but he was not sucha man. It went sorely against the grain with him to speak of thesorrow of his home, even to such a friend as the Duke; but it wasessentially necessary to him that he should justify himself.

  "Upon my word," said the Duke, "I can't understand that there shouldbe any reason strong enough to make you throw your party over."

  "I have promised to take my wife abroad."

  "Is that it?" said the Duke, looking at him with surprise, but at thesame time with something of returning joviality in his face. "Nobodythinks of going abroad at this time of the year. Of course, you canget away for a time when Parliament breaks up."

  "But I have promised to go at once."

  "Then, considering your position, you have made a promise which itbehoves you to break. I am sure Lady Glencora will see it in thatlight."

  "You do not quite understand me, and I am afraid I must trouble youto listen to matters which, under other circumstances, it wouldbe impertinent in me to obtrude upon you." A certain stiffness ofdemeanour, and measured propriety of voice, much at variance with hisformer manner, came upon him as he said this.

  "Of course, Palliser, I don't want to interfere for a moment."

  "If you will allow me, Duke. My wife has told me that, this morning,which makes me feel that absence from England is requisite for herpresent comfort. I was with her when you came, and had just promisedher that she should go."

  "But, Palliser, think of it. If this were a small matter, I wouldnot press you; but a man in your position has public duties. He oweshis services to his country. He has no right to go back, if it bepossible that he should so do."

  "When a man has given his word, it cannot be right that he should goback from that."

  "Of course not. But a man may be absolved from a promise. LadyGlencora--"

  "My wife would, of course, absolve me. It is not that. Her happinessdemands it, and it is partly my fault that it is so. I cannot explainto you more fully why it is that I must give up the great object forwhich I have striven with all my strength."

  "Oh, no!" said the Duke. "If you are sure that it is imperative--"

  "It is imperative."

  "I could give you twenty-four hours, you know." Mr. Palliser didnot answer at once, and the Duke thought that he saw some sign ofhesitation. "I suppose it would not be possible that I should speakto Lady Glencora?"

  "It could be of no avail, Duke. She would only declare, at the firstword, that she would remain in London but it would not be the lessmy duty on that account to take her abroad."

  "Well; I can't say. Of course, I can't say. Such an opportunity maynot come twice in a man's life. And at your age too! You are throwingaway from you the finest political position that the world can offerto the ambition of any man. No one at your time of life has had sucha chance within my memory. That a man under thirty should be thoughtfit to be Chancellor of the Exchequer, and should refuse it,--becausehe wants to take his wife abroad! Palliser, if she were dying, youshould remain under such an emergency as this. She might go, but youshould remain."

  Mr. Palliser remained silent for a moment or two in his chair; he thenrose and walked towards the window, as he spoke. "There are thingsworse than death," he said, when his back was turned. His voice wasvery low, and there was a tear in his eye as he spoke them; the wordswere indeed whispered, but the Duke heard them, and felt that hecould not press him any more on the subject of his wife.

  "And must this be final?" said the Duke.

  "I think it must. But your visit here has come so quickly on myresolution to go abroad,--which, in truth, was only made ten minutesbefore your name was brought to me,--that I believe I ought to askfor a portion of those twenty-four hours which you have offered me. Asmall portion will be enough. Will you see me, if I come to you thisevening, say at eight? If the House is up in the Lords I will go toyou in St. James's Square."

  "We shall be sitting after eight, I think."

  "Then I will see you there. And, Duke, I must ask you to think of mein this matter as a friend should think, and not as though we werebound together only by party feeling."

  "I will,--I will."

  "I have told you what I shall never whisper to any one else."

  "I think you know that you are safe with me."

  "I am sure of it. And, Duke, I can tell you that the sacrifice to mewill be almost more than I can bear. This thing that you have offeredme to-day is the only thing that I have ever coveted. I have thoughtof it and worked for it, have hoped and despaired, have for momentsbeen vain enough to think that it was within my strength, and havebeen wretched for weeks together because I have told myself that itwas utterly beyond me."

  "As to that, neither Brock nor I, nor any of us, have any doubt.Finespun himself says that you are the man."

  "I am much obliged to them. But I say all this simply that you mayunderstand how imperative is the duty which, as I think, requires meto refuse the offer."

  "But you haven't refused as yet," said the Duke. "I shall wait at theHouse for you, whether they are sitting or not. And endeavour to joinus. Do the best you can. I will say nothing as to that duty of whichyou speak; but if it can be made compatible with your public service,pray--pray let it be done. Remember how much such a one as you owesto his country." Then the Duke went, and Mr. Palliser was alone.

  He had not been alone before since the revelation which had been madeto him by his wife, and the words she had spoken were still soundingin his ears. "I do love Burgo Fitzgerald;--I do! I do! I do!" Theywere not pleasant words for a young husband to hear. Men there are,no doubt, whose nature would make them more miserable under theinfliction than it had made Plantagenet Palliser. He was calm,without strong passion, not prone to give to words a strongersignificance than they should bear;--and he was essentiallyunsuspicious. Never for a moment had he thought, even while thosewords were hissing in his ears, that his wife had betrayed hishonour. Nevertheless, there was that at his heart, as he rememberedthose words, which made him feel that the world was almost too heavyfor him. For the first quarter of an hour after the Duke's departurehe thought more of his wife and of Burgo Fitzgerald than he did ofLord Brock and Mr. Finespun. But of this he was aware,--that he hadforgiven his wife; that he had put his arm round her and embraced herafter hearing her confession,--and that she, mutely, with her eyes,had promised him that she would do her best for him. Then somethingof an idea of love came across his heart, and he acknowledged tohimself that he had married without loving or without requiring love.Much of all this had been his own fault. Indeed, had not the wholeof it come from his own wrong-doing? He acknowledged that it was so.But now,--now he loved her.
He felt that he could not bear to partwith her, even if there were no question of public scandal, or ofdisgrace. He had been torn inwardly by that assertion that she lovedanother man. She had got at his heart-strings at last. There are menwho may love their wives, though they never can have been in lovebefore their marriage.

  When the Duke had been gone about an hour, and when, under ordinarycircumstances, it would have been his time to go down to the House,he took his hat and walked into the Park. He made his way across HydePark, and into Kensington Gardens, and there he remained for an hour,walking up and down beneath the elms. The quidnuncs of the town, whochanced to see him, and who had heard something of the politicalmovements of the day, thought, no doubt, that he was meditating hisfuture ministerial career. But he had not been there long before hehad resolved that no ministerial career was at present open to him."It has been my own fault," he said, as he returned to his house,"and with God's help I will mend it, if it be possible."

  But he was a slow man, and he did not go off instantly to the Duke.He had given himself to eight o'clock, and he took the full time.He could not go down to the House of Commons because men would makeinquiries of him which he would find it difficult to answer. So hedined at home, alone. He had told his wife that he would see her atnine, and before that hour he would not go to her. He sat alone tillit was time for him to get into his brougham, and thought it allover. That seat in the Cabinet and Chancellorship of the Exchequer,which he had so infinitely desired, were already done with. There wasno doubt about that. It might have been better for him not to havemarried; but now that he was married, and that things had broughthim untowardly to this pass, he knew that his wife's safety was hisfirst duty. "We will go through Switzerland," he said to himself, "toBaden, and then we will get on to Florence and to Rome. She has seennothing of all these things yet, and the new life will make a changein her. She shall have her own friend with her." Then he went down tothe House of Lords, and saw the Duke.

  "Well, Palliser," said the Duke, when he had listened to him, "ofcourse I cannot argue it with you any more. I can only say that I amvery sorry;--more sorry than perhaps you will believe. Indeed, ithalf breaks my heart." The Duke's voice was very sad, and it mightalmost have been thought that he was going to shed a tear. In truthhe disliked Mr. Finespun with the strongest political feeling of whichhe was capable, and had attached himself to Mr. Palliser almost asstrongly. It was a thousand pities! How hard had he not worked tobring about this arrangement, which was now to be upset because awoman had been foolish! "I never above half liked her," said the Duketo himself, thinking perhaps a little of the Duchess's complaintsof her. "I must go to Brock at once," he said aloud, "and tell him.God knows what we must do now. Goodbye! good-bye! No; I'm not angry.There shall be no quarrel. But I am very sorry." In this way the twopoliticians parted.

  We may as well follow this political movement to its end. The Dukesaw Lord Brock that night, and then those two ministers sent foranother minister,--another noble Lord, a man of great experiencein Cabinets. These three discussed the matter together, and on thefollowing day Lord Brock got up in the House, and made a strongspeech in defence of his colleague, Mr. Finespun. To the end of theSession, at any rate, Mr. Finespun kept his position, and held theseals of the Exchequer while all the quidnuncs of the nation, shakingtheir heads, spoke of the wonderful power of Mr. Finespun, anddeclared that Lord Brock did not dare to face the Opposition withouthim.

  In the meantime Mr. Palliser had returned to his wife, and told her ofhis resolution with reference to their tour abroad. "We may as wellmake up our minds to start at once," said he. "At any rate, there isnothing on my side to hinder us."