THE PRIME MINISTER

by DAVID SKILTON

  ‘The member for the county?’

  ‘Yes; and a very good member he is too, though he doesn’t support us; – an old-school Tory, but a great friend of my uncle, who after all had a good deal of the Tory about him. I wonder whether he is at home. I must remind the Duchess to ask him to dinner. You know him, of course.’

  ‘Only by just seeing him in the House.’

  ‘You’d like him very much. When in the country he always wears knee breeches and gaiters, which I think a very comfortable dress.’

  ‘Troublesome, Duke; isn’t it?’

  ‘I never tried it, and I shouldn’t dare now. Goodness me; it’s past five o’clock, and we’ve got two miles to get home. I haven’t looked at a letter, and Warburton will think that I’ve thrown myself into the river because of Sir Timothy Beeswax.’ Then they started to go home at a fast pace.

  ‘I shan’t forget, Duke,’ said Phineas, ‘your definition of Conservatives and Liberals.’

  ‘I don’t think I ventured on a definition; – only a few loose ideas which had been troubling me lately. I say, Finn!’

  ‘Your Grace?’

  ‘Don’t you go and tell Ramsden and Drummond that I have been preaching equality, or we shall have a pretty mess. I don’t know that it would serve me with my dear friend, the Duke.’

  ‘I will be discretion itself.’

  ‘Equality is a dream. But sometimes one likes to dream, – especially as there is no danger that Matching will fly from me in a dream. I doubt whether I could bear the test that has been attempted in other countries.’

  ‘That poor ploughman would hardly get his share, Duke.’

  ‘No; – that’s where it is. We can only do a little and a little to bring it nearer to us; – so little that it won’t touch Matching in our day. Here is her ladyship and the ponies. I don’t think her ladyship would like to lose her ponies by my doctrine.’

  The two wives of the two men were in the pony carriage, and the little Lady Glencora, the Duchess’s eldest daughter, was sitting between them. ‘Mr Warburton has sent three messengers to demand your presence,’ said the Duchess, ‘and, as I live by bread, I believe that you and Mr Finn have been amusing yourselves!’

  ‘We have been talking politics,’ said the Duke.

  ‘Of course. What other amusement was possible? But what business have you to indulge in idle talk when Mr Warburton wants you in the library? There has come a box,’ she said, ‘big enough to contain the resignations of all the traitors of the party.’ This was strong language, and the Duke frowned; – but there was no one there to hear it but Phineas Finn and his wife, and they, at least, were trustworthy. The Duke suggested that he had better get back to the house as soon as possible. There might be something to be done requiring time before dinner. Mr Warburton might, at any rate, want to smoke a tranquil cigar after his day’s work. The Duchess therefore left the carriage, as did Mrs Finn, and the Duke undertook to drive the little girl back to the house. ‘He’ll surely go against a tree,’ said the Duchess. But, – as a fact, – the Duke did take himself and the child home in safety.

  ‘And what do you think about it, Mr Finn?’ said her Grace. ‘I suppose you and the Duke have been settling what is to be done.’

  ‘We have certainly settled nothing.’

  ‘Then you must have disagreed.’

  ‘That we as certainly have not done. We have in truth not once been out of cloud-land.’

  ‘Ah; – then there is no hope. When once grown-up politicians get into cloud-land it is because the realities of the world have no longer any charm for them.’

  The big box did not contain the resignations of any of the objectionable members of the Coalition. Ministers do not often resign in September, – nor would it be expedient that they should do so. Lord Drummond and Sir Timothy were safe, at any rate till next February, and might live without any show either of obedience or mutiny. The Duke remained in comparative quiet at Matching. There was not very much to do, except to prepare the work of the next Session. The great work of the coming year was to be the assimilation, or something very near to the assimilation, of the county suffrages with those of the boroughs. The measure was one which had now been promised by statesmen for the last two years, – promised at first with that half promise which would mean nothing, were it not that such promises always lead to more defined assurances. The Duke of St Bungay, Lord Drummond, and other Ministers had wished to stave it off. Mr Monk was eager for its adoption, and was of course supported by Phineas Finn. The Prime Minister had at first been inclined to be led by the old Duke. There was no doubt to him but that the measure was desirable and would come, but there might well be a question as to the time at which it should be made to come. The old Duke knew that the measure would come, – but believing it to be wholly undesirable, thought that he was doing good work in postponing it from year to year. But Mr Monk had become urgent, and the old Duke had admitted the necessity. There must surely have been a shade of melancholy on that old man’s mind as, year after year, he assisted in pulling down institutions which he in truth regarded as the safeguards of the nation; but which he knew that, as a Liberal, he was bound to assist in destroying! It must have occurred to him, from time to time, that it would be well for him to depart and be at peace before everything was gone.

  When he went from Matching Mr Monk took his place, and Phineas Finn, who had gone up to London for a while, returned; and then the three between them, with assistance from Mr Warburton and others, worked out the proposed scheme of the new county franchise, with the new divisions and the new constituencies. But it could hardly have been hearty work, as they all of them felt that whatever might be their first proposition they would be beat upon it in a House of Commons which thought that this Aristides21 had been long enough at the Treasury.

  CHAPTER 69

  Mrs Parker’s Fate

  Lopez had now been dead more than five months, and not a word had been heard by his widow of Mrs Parker and her children. Her own sorrows had been so great that she had hardly thought of those of the poor woman who had come to her but a few days before her husband’s death, telling her of ruin caused by her husband’s treachery. But late on the evening before her departure for Herefordshire, – very shortly after Everett had left the house, – there was a ring at the door, and a poorly-clad female asked to see Mrs Lopez. The poorly-clad female was Sexty Parker’s wife. The servant, who did not remember her, would not leave her alone in the hall, having an eye to the coats and umbrellas, but called up one of the maids to carry the message. The poor woman understood the insult and resented it in her heart. But Mrs Lopez recognized the name in a moment, and went down to her in the parlour, leaving Mr Wharton upstairs. Mrs Parker, smarting from her present grievance, had bent her mind on complaining at once of the treatment she had received from the servant, but the sight of the widow’s weeds quelled her. Emily had never been much given to fine clothes, either as a girl or as a married woman; but it had always been her husband’s pleasure that she should be well dressed, – though he had never carried his trouble so far as to pay the bills; and Mrs Parker’s remembrance of her friend at Dovercourt had been that of a fine lady in bright apparel. Now a black shade, – something almost like a dark ghost, – glided into the room, and Mrs Parker forgot her recent injury. Emily came forward and offered her hand, and was the first to speak. ‘I have had a great sorrow since we met,’ she said.

  ‘Yes, indeed, Mrs Lopez. I don’t think there is anything left in the world now except sorrow.’

  ‘I hope Mr Parker is well. Will you not sit down, Mrs Parker?’

  ‘Thank you, ma’am. Indeed, then, he is not well at all. How should he be well? Everything, – everything has been taken away from him.’ Poor Emily groaned as she heard this. ‘I wouldn’t say a word against them as is gone, Mrs Lopez, if I could help it. I know it is bad to bear when him who once loved you isn’t no more. And perhaps it is all the worse when things didn’t go well with him, and it was, maybe, his own
fault I wouldn’t do it, Mrs Lopez, if I could help it.’

  ‘Let me hear what you have to say,’ said Emily, determined to suffer everything patiently.

  ‘Well; – it is just this. He has left us that bare that there is nothing left. And that, they say, isn’t the worst of all, – though what can be worse than doing that, how is a woman to think? Parker was that soft, and he had that way with him of talking, that he has talked me and mine out of the very linen on our backs.’

  ‘What do you mean by saying that that is not the worst?’

  ‘They’ve come upon Sexty for a bill for four hundred and fifty, – something to do with that stuff they call Bios, – and Sexty says it isn’t his name at all. But he’s been in that state he don’t hardly know how to swear to anything. But he’s sure he didn’t sign it. The bill was brought to him by Lopez, and there was words between them, and he wouldn’t have nothing to do with it. How is he to go to law? And it don’t make much difference neither, for they can’t take much more from him than they have taken.’ Emily as she heard all this sat shivering, trying to repress her groans. ‘Only,’ continued Mrs Parker, ‘they hadn’t sold the furniture, and I was thinking they might let me stay in the house, and try to do with letting lodgings, – and now they’re seizing everything along of this bill. Sexty is like a mad man, swearing this and swearing that; – but what can he do, Mrs Lopez? It’s as like his hand as two peas; but he was clever at everything was, – was – you know who I mean, ma’am.’ Then Emily covered her face with her hands and burst into violent tears. She had not determined whether she did or did not believe this last accusation made against her husband. She had had hardly time to realize the criminality of the offence imputed. But she did believe that the woman before her had been ruined by her husband’s speculations. ‘It’s very bad, ma’am; isn’t it?’ said Mrs Parker, crying for company. ‘It’s bad all round. If you had five children as hadn’t bread you’d know how it is that I feel. I’ve got to go back by the 10.15 to-night, and when I’ve paid for a third-class ticket I shan’t have but twopence left in the world.’

  This utter depth of immediate poverty, this want of bread for the morrow and the next day, Emily could relieve out of her own pocket. And, thinking of this and remembering that her purse was not with her at the moment, she started up with the idea of getting it. But it occurred to her that that would not suffice; that her duty required more of her than that. And yet, by her own power, she could do no more. From month to month, almost from week to week, since her husband’s death, her father had been called upon to satisfy claims for money which he would not resist, lest by doing so he should add to her misery. She had felt that she ought to bind herself to the strictest personal economy because of the miserable losses to which she had subjected him by her ill-starred marriage. ‘What would you wish me to do?’ she said, resuming her seat.

  ‘You are rich,’ said Mrs Parker. Emily shook her head. ‘They say your papa is rich. I thought you would not like to see me in want like this.’

  ‘Indeed, indeed, it makes me very unhappy.’

  ‘Wouldn’t your papa do something? It wasn’t Sexty’s fault nigh so much as it was his. I wouldn’t say it to you if it wasn’t for starving. I wouldn’t say it to you if it wasn’t for the children. I’d lie in the ditch and the if it was only myself, because – because I know what your feelings is. But what wouldn’t you do, and what wouldn’t you say, if you had five children at home as hadn’t a loaf of bread among ‘em?’ Hereupon Emily got up and left the room, bidding her visitor wait for a few minutes. Presently the offensive butler came in, who had wronged Mrs Parker by watching his master’s coats, and brought a tray with meat and wine. Mr Wharton, said the altered man, hoped that Mrs Parker would take a little refreshment, and he would be down himself very soon. Mrs Parker, knowing that strength for her journey home would be necessary to her, remembering that she would have to walk all through the city to the Bishopgate Street station, did take some refreshment, and permitted herself to drink the glass of sherry that her late enemy had benignantly poured out for her.

  Emily had been nearly half an hour with her father before Mr Wharton’s heavy step was heard upon the stairs. And when he reached the dining-room door he paused a moment before he ventured to turn the lock. He had not told Emily what he would do, and had hardly as yet made up his own mind. As every fresh call was made upon him, his hatred for the memory of the man who had stepped in and disturbed his whole life, and turned all the mellow satisfaction of his evening into storm and gloom, was of course increased. The scoundrel’s name was so odious to him that he could hardly keep himself from shuddering visibly before his daughter even when the servants called her by it. But yet he had determined that he would devote himself to save her from further suffering. It had been her fault, no doubt. But she was expiating it in very sackcloth and ashes, and he would add nothing to the burden on her back. He would pay, and pay, and pay, merely remembering that what he paid must be deducted from her share of his property. He had never intended to make what is called an elder son of Everett, and now there was less necessity than ever that he should do so, as Everett had become an elder son in another direction. He could satisfy almost any demand that might be made without material injury to himself. But these demands, one after another, scalded him by their frequency, and by the baseness of the man who had occasioned them. His daughter had now repeated to him with sobbings and wailings the whole story as it had been told to her by the woman downstairs. ‘Papa,’ she had said, ‘I don’t know how to tell you or how not.’ Then he had encouraged her, and had listened without saying a word. He had endeavoured not even to shrink as the charge of forgery was repeated to him by his own child, – the widow of the guilty man. He endeavoured not to remember at the moment that she had claimed this wretch as the chosen one of her maiden heart, in opposition to all his wishes. It hardly occurred to him to disbelieve the accusation. It was so probable! What was there to hinder the man from forgery, if he could only make it believed that his victim had signed the bill when intoxicated? He heard it all; – kissed his daughter, and then went down to the dining-room.

  Mrs Parker, when she saw him, got up, and curtsied low, and then sat down again. Old Wharton looked at her from under his bushy eyebrows before he spoke, and then sat opposite to her. ‘Madam,’ he said, ‘this is a very sad story that I have heard.’ Mrs Parker again rose, again curtsied, and put her handkerchief to her face. ‘It is of no use talking any more about it here.’

  ‘No, sir,’ said Mrs Parker.

  ‘I and my daughter leave town early to-morrow morning.’

  ‘Indeed, sir. Mrs Lopez didn’t tell me.’

  ‘My clerk will be in London, at No. 12, Stone Buildings, Lincoln’s Inn, till I come back. Do you think you can find the place? I have written it there.’

  ‘Yes, sir, I can find it,’ said Mrs Parker, just raising herself from her chair at every word she spoke.

  ‘I have written his name, you see. Mr Crumpy.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘If you will permit me, I will give you two sovereigns now.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  ‘And if you can make it convenient to call on Mr Crumpy every Thursday morning about twelve, he will pay you two sovereigns a week till I come back to town. Then I will see about it.’

  ‘God Almighty bless you, sir!’

  ‘And as to the furniture, I will write to my attorney, Mr Walker. You need not trouble yourself by going to him.’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘If necessary he will send to you, and he will see what can be done. Good night, Mrs Parker.’ Then he walked across the room with two sovereigns which he dropped in her hand. Mrs Parker, with many sobs, bade him farewell, and Mr Wharton stood in the hall immovable till the front door had been closed behind her. ‘I have settled it,’ he said to Emily. ‘I’ll tell you to-morrow, or some day. Don’t worry yourself now, but go to bed.’ She looked wistfully, – so sadly, up into his face, and then did
as he bade her.

  But Mr Wharton could not go to his bed without further trouble. It was incumbent on him to write full particulars that very night both to Mr Walker and to Mr Crumpy. And the odious letters in the writing became very long; – odious because he had to confess in them over and over again that his daughter, the very apple of his eye, had been the wife of a scoundrel. To Mr Walker he had to tell the whole story of the alleged forgery, and in doing so could not abstain from the use of hard words. ‘I don’t suppose that it can be proved, but there is every reason to believe that it’s true.’ And again – ‘I believe the man to have been as vile a scoundrel as ever was made by the love of money.’ Even to Mr Crumpy he could not be reticent. ‘She is an object of pity,’ he said. ‘Her husband was ruined by the infamous speculations of Mr Lopez.’ Then he betook himself to bed. Oh, how happy would he be to pay the two pounds weekly, – even to add to that the amount of the forged bill, if by doing so he might be saved from ever again hearing the name of Lopez.

  The amount of the bill was ultimately lost by the bankers who had advanced money on it. As for Mrs Sexty Parker, from week to week, and from month to month, and at last from year to year, she and her children, – and probably her husband also, – were supported by the weekly pension of two sovereigns which she always received on Thursday mornings from the hands of Mr Crumpy himself. In a little time the one excitement of her life was the weekly journey to Mr Crumpy, whom she came to regard as a man appointed by Providence to supply her with 40 s. on Thursday morning. As to poor Sexty Parker, – it is to be feared that he never again became a prosperous man.

  ‘You will tell me what you did for that poor woman, papa,’ said Emily, leaning over her father in the train.

  ‘I have settled it, my dear.’

  ‘You said you’d tell me.’

  ‘Crumpy will pay her two pounds a week till we know more about it.’ Emily pressed her father’s hand, and that was an end. No one ever did know any more about it, and Crumpy continued to pay the money.