Crying for the Light Volume Ii Part 17

'Ah, Mr. Johnson, you remember me!'

'I should think so, sir. We all missed you when you left Bethesda Chapel. But what have you been doing?'

'Only speaking the truth to the free and independent electors of this enlightened borough.'

'You mean casting pearls before swine.'

'Well, I fear that is the proper way of putting it; but neither you nor I may say that in this place, and especially at this time.'

'No, the people are half crazy, and most of them tipsy. They always are so at election time. I can't say who are the worst, Liberals or Tories, rich or poor-they all seem to me bad alike. The fact is, parties are very fairly divided here, that the election is really in the hands of a few, who only want a debauch, and don't care a rap for politics of any kind. The only question with them is, Who will spend the most money?

But what are you going to do?'

'Why, get out of the place as soon as possible.'

'Well, perhaps that is the best thing you can do; but first let me see if I can't help to make you look a little more respectable.'

The attempt was partly successful; and having washed and covered his rags with a great-coat, and exchanged his battered hat for a travelling cap, Wentworth took his seat in a first-cla.s.s carriage, and, lighting his cigar, mused on the dangers he had run, and the disgusting scene of which he had been a witness.

'Good heavens!' said he to himself, 'what a farce! And yet there are those who say, _Vox populi_, _vox dei_! Happily, as a rule, we get gentlemen in Parliament, and the result of an election is not bad on the whole. Shall we be able to say as much when a lower cla.s.s of candidates are returned?'

The Liberal press were angry, and Wentworth came in for his share of abuse. He laughed as he read of his wickedness. Still more did he laugh as he thought of the people who had interviewed him-the needy Scotchman who sympathized with his manly struggle, had read his speeches with undying interest, who fervently prayed that he might win, and who, though he was not an elector, felt sure that Wentworth was a Scotchman, and would lend a brother Scot a small loan; the ladies who had endeavoured to capture him by storm; the collectors of various great societies who felt sure that Wentworth would not refuse to subscribe to their funds, as all the Liberal candidates had done the same; the stupid questions he had to answer; the slanders of which he had been the victim; the enthusiasm he had evoked; the temporary importance he had achieved. It was an experience which he would not have missed, and so far he was quite satisfied with the result.

CHAPTER XX.

A STORM BREWING.

The elections were over; Parliament had met; the n.o.bles of the land had returned to town as well as their toadies, and admirers, and imitators; and all was gay and glittering in the parks, at the clubs, and in Belgravian _salons_. The _quidnuncs_ of society were as busy as bees.

In our time the Church and the theatre are in equal request, and it is hard to say who is the winner in the race for public favour, the last new star at the theatre or the last pulpit pet; the last strong man of the music-hall, the newest favourite of the ring. We are a catholic-minded people, and are grateful to anyone who will give us something to talk about.

For once the shopkeepers of Regent Street and Bond Street were in good spirits. There was every prospect of a successful season. London was full, and there was no end of society b.a.l.l.s and dinners. An Austrian archduke was to appear on the scene. One of the richest of the American Bonanza kings had taken a great house in Grosvenor Square.

The deserted palace of Buckingham would once more open its doors, and there were to be Drawing-rooms, whether as regards numbers or brilliancy rivalling any that had ever been held.

We had a strong Government, with a strong majority behind, and speculators on the Stock Exchange were buying for a rise. The Rothschilds of London and Paris and Vienna had all agreed that there should be peace, and it was also understood that a great German Chancellor had kindly condescended to intimate that for the present, at any rate, the sword might be sheathed, and that honest peasant lads, instead of being served up as food for powder, might be usefully employed in agricultural occupations, much to the joy of hotel-keepers on the Rhine, at Baden-Baden and elsewhere. Even in the valleys and mountains of the Alps, in the new nation of Italy, in the gilded palaces of the Sultan on the Bosphorus, there was unusual light-heartedness, for the Eastern Question was indefinitely postponed. The talk of the clubs had ceased to have any reference to politics. A great calm had settled everywhere in the East of London, where poverty makes men Radicals and Social Democrats, and in the West, where the only burning question of the hour is how to put off the day of reckoning to a more convenient season.

If it had not been for the occasional appearance of a wealthy American heiress, whose father had 'struck ile,' of a fair Anonyma on horseback, in an exquisitely-appointed equipage in some fashionable thoroughfare, or for a whisper of a scandal in high life, or for a wild adventure now and then of a man about town, or the unexpected collapse of a favourite on the turf, or the disgraceful bankruptcy of a pious banker, society would have been duller than ditch water. As it was, what to do with the heavy hours intervening between luncheon and dinner seemed a problem too difficult for human ingenuity-even when most fitly trained and fairly developed-to solve.

It was precisely at this trying hour Sir Watkin Strahan might be seen lolling idly and discontentedly in one of the many armchairs which adorned the smoking-room of his Piccadilly club. By his side was an emptied gla.s.s, the ashes of a defunct cigar, and the usual journals which are humorously supposed to be comic, or to be remarkably witty, or to represent society. He did not look particularly pleased, not even when a brother member, evidently a chip of the same block, seated himself by his side, exclaiming:

'Holloa, Sir Watkin, what brings yon up to town? I thought you were carrying all before you at Sloville.'

'Sloville be d---d!'

'Certainly, my dear friend, if you wish it. What's Hecuba to me?'

'Now, look at me, and drop that style of remark.'

We comply with the Baronet's suggestion, and look at him. He was, after all, a handsome man, carefully dressed and fitted to shine in Belgravia; soft and gentle in manner, sleek as a tiger. Time had dealt gently with him, had spared his head of hair, and saved him from the obesity which attacks most men after a certain age. Mr. Disraeli tells us that the English aristocracy do not read, and live much in the open air. Hence their juvenility. At a distance Sir Watkin looked anywhere between five-and-twenty and fifty. To-day, however, he looked nearer the latter than the former. He did not look like a good man, such as you read of in evangelical biographies or on the tombstones in churchyards and cemeteries. There was a scowl on his forehead, anger in his eye and in his tones.

'Well,' said another friend, 'all I can say is I have just seen ---,'

naming the Liberal whip, 'and he's terribly cut up. He thought you were safe for Sloville.'

'So I should have been if it had not been for that infernal Wentworth.

My canva.s.sers and election agent made me feel quite certain of success.

I believe they humbugged me frightfully.'

'Oh, they always do that. It is their nature.'

'But it is none the less disagreeable. My own opinion is, there was a good deal of bribery. Money seemed very plentiful. The Carlton had a finger in the pie. Old Shrouder was there; and he is always at his old game. There is not another such a rascal in all England.'

'That's saying a great deal. I wonder how the old scamp has managed to keep out of Newgate.'

'Lord bless you, man! you know none of our hands are very clean; but I am sure I could get the new M.P. unseated on pet.i.tion.'

'What, and claim the vacant seat?'

'No, alas! that won't do. How can I say what my agent was up to, or what was done by idiotic friends? The law is so particular. They make out everything to be bribery nowadays. It is precious hard nowadays for a gentleman to get into Parliament, and that is a rascally shame. We have been in the place for a hundred years. There is not a charity in it I don't support. I have spent a fortune in nursing the town. All I can say is, next Christmas some of the free and independent will feel rather silly when they miss the coals and blankets, and find the key of the wine cellar lost.'

'I can't make it out; there must be some other reason. Do you think that fellow Wentworth had anything to do with your defeat?' asked the Baronet's friend. 'You know he seems to be rather high-minded, and these men are in the way at an election.'

'Well, he might, with his nonsense, have kept some of the voters away. I did hear some ill-natured gossip about myself, but I can't trace it to him.'

'Oh!' said his friend; 'that's what I was waiting for. The British mob won't stand that sort of thing, though they ill-use their wives every day.'

'Why, I never said what the gossip was.'

'No, but I know. You're not a saint, Sir Watkin.'

'Nor you either. The people, somehow or other, had got it into their heads that I behaved badly to a Sloville girl.'

'A thing you could never think of doing,' said his friend, with affected indignation.

'No, it is too near home,' said the Baronet.

'But you know I have always said to you that the way in which you went on with women would, one day or other, get you into a sc.r.a.pe. Stick to the married ones, and leave the young ones alone. That is my plan. If you get into a mess then, the woman is bound to help you out. The chances, you see, are two to one in your favour. But there is a better plan still.'

'What is that?'

'Leave 'em alone. They all mean mischief.'

'Well, it is not everyone who is such a cool hand as you are.'

'So much the worse for other people,' was the reply. 'But in the case of that Sloville girl, I really don't see you have anything to reproach yourself with. She ran away from you, did she not? and I don't see how any mischief could be made of that. I suppose she is still able to carry on the highly respectable calling of a dressmaker; I think she was that.

She was an uncommonly fine girl; there was quite a style about her; and a girl like that can't take much harm-that is, as long as she keeps her good looks.'

'Oh no, the girl is all right. She is now the popular Miss Howard, of the --- Theatre.'