THE PRIME MINISTER

by DAVID SKILTON

  Matters were in this condition at Longbarns when Arthur communicated to his brother the contents of Mr Gresham’s letter, and expressed his own purpose of giving up Silverbridge. ‘I don’t quite see that,’ said John.

  ‘No; – and it is impossible that you should be expected to see it I don’t quite know how to talk about it even to you, though I think you are about the softest-hearted fellow out.’

  ‘I don’t acknowledge the soft heart; – but go on.’

  ‘I don’t want to interfere with that man. I have a sort of feeling that as he has got her he might as well have the seat too.’

  ‘The seat, as you call it, is not there for his gratification or for yours. The seat is there in order that the people of Silverbridge may be represented in Parliament.’

  ‘Let them get somebody else. I don’t want to put myself in opposition to him, and I certainly do not want to oppose her.’

  ‘They can’t change their candidate in that way at a day’s notice. You would be throwing Gresham over, and, if you ask me, I think that is a thing you have no right to do. This objection of yours is sentimental, and there is nothing of which a man should be so much in dread as sentimentalism. It is not your fault that you oppose Mr Lopez. You were in the field first, and you must go on with it.’ John Fletcher, when he spoke in this way, was, at Longbarns, always supposed to be right; and on the present occasion he, as usual, prevailed. Then Arthur Fletcher wrote his letter to the lady. He would not have liked to have had it known that the composition and copying of that little note had cost him an hour. He had wished that she should understand his feelings, and yet it was necessary that he should address her in words that should be perfectly free from affection or emotion. He must let her know that, though he wrote to her, the letter was for her husband as well as for herself, and he must do this in a manner which would not imply any fear that his writing to her would be taken amiss. The letter when completed was at any rate simple and true; and yet, as we know, it was taken very much amiss.

  Arthur Fletcher had by no means recovered from the blow he had received that day when Emily had told him everything down by the river side; but then, it must be said of him, that he had no intention of recovery. He was as a man who, having taken a burden on his back, declares to himself that he will, for certain reasons, carry it throughout his life. The man knows that with the burden he cannot walk as men walk who are unencumbered, but for those reasons of his he has chosen to lade himself, and having done so he abandons regret and submits to his circumstances. So had it been with him. He would make no attempt to throw off the load. It was now far back in his life, as much at least as three years, since he at first assured himself of his desire to make Emily Wharton the companion of his life. From that day she had been the pivot on which his whole existence had moved. She had refused his offers more than once, but had done so with so much tender kindness, that, though he had found himself to be wounded and bruised, he had never abandoned his object Her father and all his own friends encouraged him. He was continually told that her coldness was due to the simple fact that she had not yet learned to give her heart away. And so he had persevered, being ever thoroughly intent on his purpose, till he was told by herself that her love was given to this other man.

  Then he knew that it behoved him to set some altered course of life before him. He could not shoot his rival or knock him over the head, nor could he carry off his girl, as used to be done in rougher times. There was nothing now for a man in such a catastrophe as this but submission. But he might submit and shake off his burden, or submit and carry it hopelessly. He told himself that he would do the latter. She had been his goddess, and he would not now worship at another shrine. And then ideas came into his head, – not hopes, or purposes, or a belief even in any possibility, – but vague ideas, mere castles in the air, that a time might come in which it might be in his power to serve her, and to prove to her beyond doubting what had been the nature of his love. Like others of his family, he thought ill of Lopez, believing the man to be an adventurer, one who would too probably fall into misfortune, however high he might now seem to hold his head. He was certainly a man not standing on the solid basis of land, or of Three per Cents, – those solidities to which such as the Whartons and Fletchers are wont to trust. No doubt, should there be such fall, the man’s wife would have other help than that of her rejected lover. She had a father, brother, and cousins, who would also be there to aid her. The idea was, therefore; but a castle in the air. And yet it was dear to him. At any rate he resolved that he would live for it, and that the woman should still be his goddess, though she was the wife of another man, and might now perhaps never even be seen by him. Then there came upon him, immediately almost after her marriage, the necessity of writing to her. The task was one which, of course, he did not perform lightly.

  He never said a word of this to anybody else; – but his brother understood it all, and in a somewhat silent fashion fully sympathized with him. John could not talk to him about love, or mark passages of poetry for him to read, or deal with him at all romantically; but he could take care that his brother had the best horses to ride, and the warmest corner out shooting, and that everything in the house should be done for his brother’s comfort. As the squire looked and spoke at Longbarns, others looked and spoke, – so that everybody knew that Mr Arthur was to be contradicted in nothing. Had he, just at this period, ordered a tree in the park to be cut down, it would, I think, have been cut down, without reference to the master! But, perhaps, John’s power was most felt in the way in which he repressed the expressions of his mother’s high indignation. ‘Mean slut!’ she once said, speaking of Emily in her eldest son’s hearing. For the girl, to her thinking, had been mean and had been a slut. She had not known, – so Mrs Fletcher thought, – what birth and blood required of her.

  ‘Mother,’ John Fletcher had said, ‘you would break Arthur’s heart if he heard you speak in that way, and I am sure you would drive him from Longbarns. Keep it to yourself.’ The old woman had shaken her head angrily, but she had endeavoured to do as she had been bid.

  ‘Isn’t your brother riding that horse a little rashly?’ Reginald Cotgrave said to John Fletcher in the hunting field one day.

  ‘I didn’t observe,’ said John; ‘but whatever horse he’s on he always rides rashly.’ Arthur was mounted on a long, raking thorough-bred black animal, which he had bought himself about a month ago, and which, having been run at steeplechases, rushed at every fence as though he were going to swallow it His brother had begged him to put some rough-rider up till the horse could be got to go quietly, but Arthur had persevered. And during the whole of this day the squire had been in a tremor, lest there should be some accident.

  ‘He used to have a little more judgment, I think,’ said Cotgrave. ‘He went at that double just now as hard as the brute could tear. If the horse hadn’t done it all, where would he have been?’

  ‘In the further ditch, I suppose. But you see the horse did do it all.’

  This was all very well as an answer to Reginald Cotgrave, – to whom it was not necessary that Fletcher should explain the circumstances. But the squire had known as well as Cotgrave that his brother had been riding rashly, and he had understood the reason why. ‘I don’t think a man ought to break his neck,’ he said, ‘because he can’t get everything that he wishes.’ The two brothers were standing then together before the fire in the squire’s own room, having just come in from hunting.

  ‘Who is going to break his neck?’

  ‘They tell me that you tried to to-day.’

  ‘Because I was riding a pulling horse. I’ll back him to be the biggest leaper and the quickest horse in Herefordshire.’

  ‘I dare say, – though for the matter of that the chances are very much against it But a man shouldn’t ride so as to have those things said of him.’

  ‘What is a fellow to do if he can’t hold a horse?’

  ‘Get off him.’

  ‘That’s nonsense, John!’r />
  ‘No, it’s not. You know what I mean very well. If I were to lose half my property tomorrow, don’t you think it would cut me up a good deal?’

  ‘It would me, I know.’

  ‘But what would you think of me if I howled about it?’

  ‘Do I howl?’ asked Arthur angrily.

  ‘Every man howls who is driven out of his ordinary course by any trouble. A man howls if he goes about frowning always.’

  ‘Do I frown?’

  ‘Or laughing.’

  ‘Do I laugh?’

  ‘Or galloping over the country like a mad devil who wants to get rid of his debts by breaking his neck. Æquam memento16 – You remember all that, don’t you?’

  ‘I remember it; but it isn’t so easy to do it?’

  ‘Try. There are other things to be done in life except getting married. You are going into Parliament’

  ‘I don’t know that.’

  ‘Gresham tells me there isn’t a doubt about it. Think of that. Fix your mind upon it. Don’t take it only as an accident, but as the thing you’re to live for. If you’ll do that, – if you’ll so manage that there shall be something to be done in Parliament which only you can do, you won’t ride a runaway horse as you did that brute to-day.’ Arthur looked up into his brother’s face almost weeping. ‘We expect much of you, you know. I’m not a man to do anything except be a good steward for the family property, and keep the old house from falling down. You’re a clever fellow, – so that between us, if we both do our duty, the Fletchers may still thrive in the land. My house shall be your house, and my wife your wife, and my children your children. And then the honour you win shall be my honour. Hold up your head, – and sell that beast.’ Arthur Fletcher squeezed his brother’s hand and went away to dress.

  CHAPTER 34

  The Silverbridge Election

  About a month after this affair with the runaway horse Arthur Fletcher went to Greshambury, preparatory to his final sojurn at Silverbridge for the week previous to his election. Greshambury, the seat of Francis Gresham, Esq., who was a great man in these parts, was about twenty miles from Silverbridge, and the tedious work of canvassing the electors could not therefore be done from thence; – but he spent a couple of pleasant days with his old friend, and learned what was being said and what was being done in and about the borough. Mr Gresham was a man, not as yet quite forty years of age, very popular, with a large family, of great wealth, and master of the county hounds. His father had been an embarrassed man, with a large estate; but this Gresham had married a lady with immense wealth, and had prospered in the world. He was not an active politician. He did not himself care for Parliament, or for the good things which political power can give; and was on this account averse to the Coalition. He thought that Sir Orlando Drought and the others were touching pitch and had defiled themselves. But he was conscious that in so thinking he was one of but a small minority; and, bad as the world around him certainly was, terrible as had been the fall of the glory of old England, he was nevertheless content to live without loud grumbling as long as the farmers paid him their rent, and the labourers in his part of the country did not strike for wages, and the land when sold would fetch thirty years’ purchase. He had not therefore been careful to ascertain that Arthur Fletcher would pledge himself to oppose the Coalition before he proffered his assistance in this matter of the borough. It would not be easy to find such a candidate, or perhaps possible to bring him in when found. The Fletchers had always been good Conservatives, and were proper people to be in Parliament. A Conservative in Parliament is, of course, obliged to promote a great many things which he does not really approve. Mr Gresham quite understood that. You can’t have tests and qualifications, rotten boroughs and the divine right of kings, back again. But as the glorious institutions of the country are made to perish, one after the other, it is better that they should receive the coup de grace tenderly from loving hands than be roughly throttled by Radicals. Mr Gresham would thank his stars that he could still preserve foxes down in his own country, instead of doing any of this dirty work, – for let the best be made of such work, still it was dirty, – and was willing, now as always, to give his assistance, and if necessary to spend a little money, to put a Fletcher into Parliament and to keep a Lopez out.

  There was to be a third candidate. That was the first news that Fletcher heard. ‘It will do us all the good in the world,’ said Mr Gresham. ‘The rads in the borough are not satisfied with Mr Lopez. They say they don’t know him. As long as a certain set could make it be believed that he was the Duke’s nominee they were content to accept him; – even though he was not proposed directly by the Duke’s people in the usual way. But the Duke has made himself understood at last. You have seen the Duke’s letter?’ Arthur had not seen the Duke’s letter, which had only been published in the Silverbridge Gazette of that week, and he now read it, sitting in Mr Gresham’s magistrate’s-room, as a certain chamber in the house had been called since the days of the present squire’s great-grandfather.

  The Duke’s letter was addressed to his recognized man of business in those parts, and was as follows:

  Carl ton Terrace,—March, 187—.

  MY DEAR MR MORETON

  (Mr Moreton was the successor of one Mr Fothergill, who had reigned supreme in those parts under the old Duke.)

  I am afraid that my wishes with regard to the borough and the forthcoming election there of a member of Parliament are not yet clearly understood, although I endeavoured to declare them when I was at Gatherum Casde. I trust that no elector will vote for this or that gentleman with an idea that the return of any special candidate will please me. The ballot will of course prevent me or any other man from knowing how an elector may vote;17 – but I beg to assure the electors generally that should they think fit to return a member pledged to oppose the Government of which I form a part, it would not in any way change my cordial feelings towards the town. I may perhaps be allowed to add that, in my opinion, no elector can do his duty except by voting for the candidate whom he thinks best qualified to serve the country. In regard to the gentlemen who are now before the constituency, I have no feeling for one rather than for the other, and had I any such feeling I should not wish it to actuate the vote of a single elector. I should be glad if this letter could be published so as to be brought under the eyes of the electors generally.

  Yours faithfully,

  OMNIUM.

  When the Duke said that he feared that his wishes were not understood, and spoke of the inefficacy of his former declaration, he was alluding of course to the Duchess and to Mr Spnigeon. Mr Sprugeon guessed that it might be so, and, still wishing to have the Duchess for his good friend, was at once assiduous in explaining to his friends in the borough that even this letter did not mean anything. A Prime Minister was bound to say that kind of thing! But the borough, if it wished to please the Duke, must return Lopez in spite of the Duke’s letter. Such was Mr Sprugeon’s doctrine. But he did not carry Mr Sprout with him. Mr Sprout at once saw his opportunity, and suggested to Mr Du Boung, the local brewer, that he should come forward. Du Boung was a man rapidly growing into provincial eminence, and jumped at the offer. Consequently there were three candidates. Du Boung came forward as a Conservative prepared to give a cautious, but very cautious, support to the Coalition.18 Mr Du Boung in his printed address said very sweet things of the Duke generally. The borough was blessed by the vicinity of the Duke. But, looking at the present perhaps unprecedented crisis in affairs, Mr Du Boung was prepared to give no more than a very cautious support to the Duke’s Government. Arthur Fletcher read Mr Du Boung’s address immediately after the Duke’s letter.

  ‘The more the merrier,’ said Arthur.

  Just so. Du Boung will not rob you of a vote, but he will cut the ground altogether from under the other man’s feet. You see that as far as actual political programme goes there isn’t much to choose between any of you. You are all Government men.’

  ‘With a difference.’

/>   ‘One man in these days is so like another,’ continued Gresham sarcastically, ‘that it requires good eyes to see the shades of the colours.’

  ‘Then you’d better support Du Boung,’ said Arthur.

  ‘I think you’ve just a turn in your favour. Besides, I couldn’t really carry a vote myself. As for Du Boung, I’d sooner have him than a foreign cad like Lopez.’ Then Arthur Fletcher frowned and Mr Gresham became confused, remembering the catastrophe about the young lady whose story he had heard. ‘Du Boung used to be plain English as Bung before he got rich and made his name beautiful,’ continued Gresham, ‘but I suppose Mr Lopez does come of foreign extraction.’

  ‘I don’t know what he comes from,’ said Arthur moodily. ‘They tell me he’s a gentleman. However, as we are to have a contest, I hope he mayn’t win.’

  ‘Of course you do. And he shan’t win. Nor shall the great Du Boung. You shall win, and become Prime Minister, and make me a peer. Would you like papa to be Lord Greshambury?’ he said to a little girl, who then rushed into the room.

  ‘No, I wouldn’t. I’d like papa to give me the pony which the man wants to sell out in the yard.’

  ‘She’s quite right, Fletcher,’ said the squire. ‘I’m much more likely to be able to buy them ponies as simple Frank Gresham than I should be if I had a lord’s coronet to pay for.’

  This was on a Saturday, and on the following Monday Mr Gresham drove the candidate over to Silverbridge and started him on his work of canvassing. Mr Du Boung had been busy ever since Mr Sprout’s brilliant suggestion had been made, and Lopez had been in the field even before him. Each one of the candidates called at the house of every elector in the borough, – and every man in the borough was an elector. When they had been at work for four or five days each candidate assured the borough that he had already received promises of votes sufficient to insure his success, and each candidate was as anxious as ever, – nay was more rabidly anxious than ever, – to secure the promise of a single vote. Hints were made by honest citizens of the pleasure they would have in supporting this or that gentleman, – for the honest citizens assured one gentleman after the other of the satisfaction they had in seeing so all-sufficient a candidate in the borough, – if the smallest pecuniary help were given them, even a day’s pay, so that their poor children might not be injured by their going to the poll. But the candidates and their agents were stern in their replies to such temptations. ‘That’s a dodge of that rascal Sprout,’ said Sprugeon to Mr Lopez. ‘That’s one of Sprout’s men. If he could get half-a-crown from you it would be all up with us.’ But though Sprugeon called Sprout a rascal, he laid the same bait both for Du Boung and for Fletcher, – but laid it in vain. Everybody said that it was a very clean election. ‘A brewer standing, and devil a glass of beer!’ said one old elector who had remembered better things when the borough never heard of a contest.