THE PRIME MINISTER

by DAVID SKILTON

  As the two walked down the street together, almost the first thing they saw was Lopez standing at his hotel door with a cutting whip in his hand. He was at that moment quite alone, but on the opposite side of the street there was a policeman, – one of the borough constables, – very slowly making his way along the pavement. His movement, indeed, was so slow that anyone watching him would have come to the conclusion that that particular part of the High Street had some attraction for him at that special moment Alas, alas! How age will alter the spirit of a man! Twenty years since Frank Gresham would have thought any one to be a mean miscreant who would have interposed a policeman between him and his foe. But it is to be feared that while selecting that stick he had said a word which was causing the constable to loiter on the pavement!

  But Gresham turned no eye to the policeman as he walked on with his friend, and Fletcher did not see the man. ‘What an ass he is!’ said Fletcher, – as he got the handle of the stick well into his hand. Then Lopez advanced to them with his whip raised; but as he did so the policeman came across the street quickly but very quietly, and stood right before him. The man was so thoroughly in the way of the aggrieved wretch that it was out of the question that he should touch Fletcher with his whip.

  ‘Do you usually walk about attended by a policeman?’ said Lopez, with all the scorn which he knew how to throw into his voice.

  ‘I didn’t know that the man was here,’ said Fletcher.

  ‘You may tell that to the marines. All the borough shall know what a coward you are.’ Then he turned round and addressed the street, but still under the shadow, as it were, of the policeman’s helmet. ‘This man who presumes to offer himself as a candidate to represent Silverbridge in Parliament has insulted my wife. And now, because he fears that I shall horsewhip him, he goes about the street under the care of a policeman.’

  ‘This is intolerable,’ said Fletcher, turning to his friend.

  ‘Mr Lopez,’ said Gresham, ‘I am sorry to say that I must give you in charge; – unless you will undertake to leave the town without interfering further with Mr Fletcher, either by word or deed.’

  ‘I will undertake nothing,’ said Lopez. ‘The man has insulted my wife, and is a coward.’

  About two o’clock on the afternoon of that day Mr Lopez appeared before the Silverbridge bench of magistrates, and was there sworn to keep the peace to Mr Fletcher for the next six months. After that he was allowed to leave the town, and was back in London, with his wife in Belgrave Mansions, to dinner that evening.

  On the day but one after this the ballot was taken, and at eight o’clock on the evening of that day Arthur Fletcher was declared to be duly elected. But Mr Du Boung ran him very hard.

  The numbers were –

  FLETCHER ...... 315

  DU BOUNG ...... 308

  Mr Du Boung’s friends during these two last days had not hesitated to make what use they could on behalf of their own candidate of the Lopez and Fletcher quarrel. If Mr Fletcher had insulted the other man’s wife, surely he could not be a proper member for Silverbridge. And then the row was declared to have been altogether discreditable. Two strangers had come into this peaceful town and had absolutely quarrelled with sticks and whips in the street, calling each other opprobrious names. Would it not be better that they should elect their own respectable townsman? All this was nearly effective. But, in spite of all, Arthur Fletcher was at last returned.

  CHAPTER 35

  Lopez Back in London

  Lopez, as he returned to town, recovered something of his senses, though he still fancied that Arthur Fletcher had done him a positive injury by writing to his wife. But something of that madness left him which had come from his deep sense of injury, both as to the letter and as to the borough, and he began to feel that he had been wrong about the horsewhip. He was very low in spirits on this return journey. The money which he had spent had been material to him, and the loss of it for the moment left him nearly bare. While he had had before his eyes the hope of being a member of Parliament he had been able to buoy himself up. The position itself would have gone very far with Sexty Parker, and would, he thought, have had some effect even with his father-in-law. But now he was returning a beaten man. Who is there that has not felt that fall from high hope to utter despair which comes from some single failure? As he thought of this he was conscious that his anger had led him into great imprudence at Silverbridge. He had not been circumspect, as it specially behoved a man to be surrounded by such difficulties as his. All his life he had been schooling his temper so as to keep it under control, – sometimes with great difficulty, but always with a consciousness that in his life everything might depend on it. Now he had, alas, allowed it to get the better of him. No doubt he had been insulted; – but, nevertheless, he had been wrong to speak of a horse-whip.

  His one great object must now be to conciliate his father-in-law, and he had certainly increased his difficulty in doing this by his squabble down at Silverbridge. Of course the whole thing would be reported in the London papers, and of course the story would be told against him, as the respectabilities of the town had been opposed to him. But he knew himself to be clever, and he still hoped that he might overcome these difficulties. Then it occurred to him that in doing this he must take care to have his wife entirely on his side. He did not doubt her love; he did not in the least doubt her rectitude – but there was the lamentable fact that she thought well of Arthur Fletcher. It might be that he had been a little too imperious with his wife. It suited his disposition to be imperious within his own household; – to be imperious out of it, if that were possible; – but he was conscious of having had a fall at Silverbridge, and he must for a while take in some sail.

  He had telegraphed to her, acquainting her with his defeat, and telling her to expect his return. ‘Oh, Ferdinand,’ she said, ‘I am so unhappy about this. It has made me so wretched!’

  ‘Better luck next time,’ he said with his sweetest smile. ‘It is no good groaning over spilt milk. They haven’t treated me really well, – have they?’

  ‘I suppose not, – though I do not quite understand it all.’

  He was burning to abuse Arthur Fletcher, but he abstained. He would abstain at any rate for the present moment. ‘Dukes and duchesses are no doubt very grand people,’ he said, ‘but it is a pity they should not know how to behave honestly, as they expect others to behave to them. The Duchess has thrown me over in the most infernal way. I really can’t understand it. When I think of it I am lost in wonder. The truth, I suppose, is, that there has been some quarrel between him and her.’

  ‘Who will get in?’

  ‘Oh, Du Boung, no doubt.’ He did not think so, but he could not bring himself to declare the success of his enemy to her. ‘The people there know him. Your old friend is as much a stranger there as I am. By-the-way, he and I had a little row in the place.’

  ‘A row, Ferdinand!’

  ‘You needn’t look like that, my pet. I haven’t killed him. But he came up to speak to me in the street, and I told him what I thought about his writing to you.’ On hearing this Emily looked very wretched. ‘I could not restrain myself from doing that Come; – you must admit that he shouldn’t have written.’

  ‘He meant it in kindness.’

  ‘Then he shouldn’t have meant it Just think of it Suppose that I had been making up to any girl, – which by-the-by I never did but to one in my life,’ – then he put his arm round her waist and kissed her, ‘and she were to have married someone else. What would have been said of me if I had begun to correspond with her immediately? Don’t suppose I am blaming you, dear.’

  ‘Certainly I do not suppose that,’ said Emily.

  ‘But you must admit that it were rather strong.’ He paused, but she said nothing. ‘Only I suppose you can bring yourself to admit nothing against him. However, so it was. There was a row, and a policeman came up, and they made me give a promise that I didn’t mean to shoot him or anything of that kind.’ As she heard this she t
urned pale, but said nothing. ‘Of course I didn’t want to shoot him. I wished him to know what I thought about it, and I told him. I hate to trouble you with all this, but I couldn’t bear that you shouldn’t know it all.’

  ‘It is very sad!’

  ‘Sad enough! I have had plenty to bear I can tell you. Everybody seemed to turn away from me there. Everybody deserted me.’ As he said this he could perceive that he must obtain her sympathy by recounting his own miseries and not Arthur Fletcher’s sins. ‘I was all alone and hardly knew how to hold up my head against so much wretchedness. And then I found myself called upon to pay an enormous sum for my expenses.’

  ‘Oh, Ferdinand!’

  ‘Think of their demanding £500!’

  ‘Did you pay it?’

  ‘Yes, indeed. I had no alternative. Of course they took care to come for that before they talked of my resigning. I believe it was all planned beforehand. The whole thing seems to me to have been a swindle, from beginning to end. By heaven, I’m almost inclined to think that the Duchess knew all about it herself!’

  ‘About the £500!’

  ‘Perhaps not the exact sum, but the way in which the thing was to be done. In these days one doesn’t know whom to trust. Men, and women too, have become so dishonest that nobody is safe anywhere. It has been awfully hard upon me, – awfully hard. I don’t suppose that there was ever a moment in my life when the loss of £500 would have been so much to me as it is now. The question is, what will your father do for us?’ Emily could not but remember her husband’s intense desire to obtain money from her father not yet three months since, as though all the world depended on his getting it, – and his subsequent elation, as though all his sorrows were over for ever, because the money had been promised. And now, – almost immediately, – he was again in the same position. She endeavoured to judge him kindly, but a feeling of insecurity in reference to his affairs struck her at once and made her heart cold. Everything had been achieved, then, by a gift of £3,000, – surely a small sum to effect such a result with a man living as her husband lived. And now the whole £3,000 was gone; – surely a large sum to have vanished in so short a time! Something of the uncertainty of business she could understand, but a business must be perilously uncertain if subject to such vicissitudes as these! But as ideas of this nature crowded themselves into her mind she told herself again and again that she had taken him for better and for worse. If the worse were already coming, she would still be true to her promise. ‘You had better tell papa everything,’ she said.

  ‘Had it not better come from you?’

  ‘No, Ferdinand. Of course I will do as you bid me. I will do anything that I can do. But you had better tell him. His nature is such that he will respect you more if it come from yourself. And then it is so necessary that he should know all; – all.’ She put whatever emphasis she knew how to use upon this word.

  ‘You could tell him – all, as well as I.’

  ‘You would not bring yourself to tell it to me, nor could I understand it He will understand everything, and if he thinks that you have told him everything, he will at any rate respect you.’

  He sat silent for a while meditating, feeling always and most acutely that he had been ill-used, – never thinking for an instant that he had ill-used others. ‘£3,000, you know, was no fortune for your father to give you!’ She had no answer to make, but she groaned in spirit as she heard the accusation. ‘Don’t you feel that yourself?’

  ‘I know nothing about money, Ferdinand. If you had told me to speak to him about it before we were married, I would have done so.’

  ‘He ought to have spoken to me. It is marvellous how close-fisted an old man can be. He can’t take it with him.’ Then he sat for half an hour in moody silence, during which she was busy with her needle. After that he jumped up, with a manner altogether altered, – gay, only that the attempt was too visible to deceive even her, – and shook himself, as though he were ridding himself of his trouble. ‘You are right, old girl. You are always right, – almost. I will go to your father to-morrow, and tell him everything. It isn’t so very much that I want him to do. Things will all come right again. I’m ashamed that you should have seen me in this way; – but I have been disappointed about the election, and troubled about that Mr Fletcher. You shall not see me give way again like this. Give me a kiss, old girl.’

  She kissed him, but she could not even pretend to recover herself as he had done. ‘Had we not better give up the brougham?’ she said.

  ‘Certainly not. For heaven’s sake do not speak in that way! You do not understand things.’

  ‘No; certainly I do not’

  ‘It isn’t that I haven’t the means of living, but that in my business money is so often required for instant use. And situated as I am at present an addition to my capital would enable me to do so much!’ She certainly did not understand it, but she had sufficient knowledge of the world and sufficient common sense to be aware that their present rate of expenditure ought to be matter of importance to a man who felt the loss of £500 as he felt that loss at Silverbridge.

  On the next morning Lopez was at Mr Wharton’s chambers early, – so early that the lawyer had not yet reached them. He had resolved, – not that he would tell everything, for such men never even intend to tell everything, – but that he would tell a good deal. He must, if possible, affect the mind of the old man in two ways. He must ingratiate himself; – and at the same time make it understood that Emily’s comfort in life would depend very much on her father’s generosity. The first must be first accomplished, if possible, – and then the second, as to which he could certainly produce at any rate belief. He had not married a rich man’s daughter without an intention of getting the rich man’s money! Mr Wharton would understand that If the worst came to the worst, Mr Wharton must of course maintain his daughter, – and his daughter’s husband! But things had not come to the worst as yet, and he did not intend on the present occasion to represent that view of his affairs to his father-in-law.

  Mr Wharton when he entered his chambers found Lopez seated there. He was himself at this moment very unhappy. He had renewed his quarrel with Everett, – or Everett rather had renewed the quarrel with him. There had been words between them about money lost at cards. Hard words had been used, and Everett had told his father that if either of them were a gambler it was not he. Mr Wharton had resented this bitterly and had driven his son from his presence, – and now the quarrel made him very wretched. He certainly was sorry that he had called his son a gambler, but his son had been, as he thought, inexcusable in the retort which he had made. He was a man to whom his friends gave credit for much sternness; – but still he was one who certainly had no happiness in the world independent of his children. His daughter had left him, not as he thought under happy auspices, – and he was now, at this moment, soft-hearted and tender in his regards as to her. What was there in the world for him but his children? And now he felt himself to be alone and destitute. He was already tired of whist at the Eldon. That which had been a delight to him once or twice a week, became almost loathsome when it was renewed from day to day; – and not the less when his son told him that he also was a gambler. ‘So you have come back from Silverbridge?’ he said.

  ‘Yes, sir; I have come back not exactly triumphant. A man should not expect to win always.’ Lopez had resolved to pluck up his spirit and carry himself like a man.

  ‘You seem to have got into some scrape down there, besides losing your election.’

  ‘Oh; you have seen that in the papers already. I have come to tell you of it As Emily is concerned in it you ought to know.’

  ‘Emily concerned! How is she concerned?’

  Then Lopez told the whole story, – after his own fashion, and yet with no palpable lie. Fletcher had written to her a letter which he had thought to be very offensive. On hearing this, Mr Wharton looked very grave, and asked for the letter. Lopez said that he had destroyed it, not thinking that such a document should be preserved. Then
he went on to explain that it had had reference to the election, and that he had thought it to be highly improper that Fletcher should write to his wife on that or on any other subject. ‘It depends very much on the letter,’ said the old man.

  ‘But on any subject, – after what has passed.’

  ‘They were very old friends.’

  ‘Of course I will not argue with you, Mr Wharton; but I own that it angered me. It angered me very much, – very much indeed. I took it to be an insult to her, and when he accosted me in the street down at Silverbridge I told him so. I may not have been very wise, but I did it on her behalf. Surely you can understand that such a letter might make a man angry.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘That he would do anything for her sake, – even retire from Silverbridge if his friends would let him.’ Mr Wharton scratched his head, and Lopez saw that he was perplexed. ‘Should he have offered to do anything for her sake, after what had passed?’

  ‘I know the man so well,’ said Mr Wharton, ‘that I cannot and do not believe him to have harboured an improper thought in reference to my child.’

  ‘Perhaps it was an indiscretion only.’

  ‘Perhaps so. I cannot say. And then they took you before the magistrates?’

  ‘Yes; – in my anger I had threatened him. Then there was a policeman and a row. And I had to swear that I would not hurt him. Of course I had no wish to hurt him.’

  ‘I suppose it ruined your chance at Silverbridge?’

  ‘I suppose it did.’ This was a lie, as Lopez had retired before the row took place. ‘What I care for most now is that you should not think that I have misbehaved myself.’

  The story had been told very well, and Mr Wharton was almost disposed to sympathize with his son-in-law. That Arthur Fletcher had meant nothing that could be regarded as offensive to his daughter he was quite sure; – but it might be that in making an offer intended to be generous he had used language which the condition of the persons concerned made indiscreet. ‘I suppose,’ he said, ‘that you spent a lot of money at Silverbridge?’ This gave Lopez the opening that he wanted, and he described the manner in which the £500 had been extracted from him. ‘You can’t play that game for nothing,’ said Mr Wharton.