The Socialist Part 39

said Rose, "and there is no earthly reason why you should become Mr.

John something or other. It would only be a pretence, and if you do, I shall change my own name to James Fabian Turnip! and as I have always told you Socialism never says that all men are equal--true Socialism that is. It only says that all men have equal rights! At the same time some of our noisy friends will go for you--though you won't mind that!"

They did "go for" him. Despite the fact that he had given up everything--his friends and relatives, his order, his tastes, there was not wanting a certain section of the baser socialistic press which spoke of "The young man with great possessions" who would give up much but not all; like all professional sectarians, rushing to the Gospels in an extremity to pick and choose a few comfortable texts from the history of One whom they alternately held up as the First Great Socialist, and then denied His definite claims to be the Veritable Son of G.o.d.

The duke minded their veiled sarcasms not at all; an open attack was never dared. But the att.i.tude gave him pain, and much material forethought. They were always quoting "The Christ," "The Man Jesus."

They continually pointed out--as it suited them upon occasion--that private property, privilege, and monopoly were attacked by Jesus, who left no doubt as to the nature of His mission.

They said, and said truly enough, that "He pictured Dives, a rich man, plunged into torment, for nothing else than for being rich when another was poor; while Lazarus, who had been nothing but poor and afflicted, is comforted and consoled. For that, those Evangelical-Nonconformists, the Pharisees, who were covetous, derided him. By the force of His personality (it was not the scourge that did it!), He drove the banking fraternity (who practised usury then as they do to-day) out of their business quarters in the Temple, and named them thieves. 'Woe to you rich, who lay up treasures, property, on earth,' He cried. And 'Blessed are ye poor, who relinquish property and minister to each other's needs,' He cried." And yet, in the same breath with which they spoke of this Supreme Man they denied His Divinity, trying to prove Him, at the same moment, an inspired Socialist, and what is more a very _practical_ One, and also a Dreamer who spoke in simile of His claims to G.o.dhead, or, and this was the more logical conclusion of their premisses, a conscious Pretender and Liar.

"He was," they said, "a Seer, as the ancient prophets were, as John, Paul, Francis of a.s.sisi, Luther, Swedenborg, Fox, and Wesley, were. Such men, modern Spiritualists and Theosophists would call 'mediums.' So great was He in wisdom and power of the spirit, that in His own day He was called 'the Son of G.o.d,' as well as 'the Son of Man,'--that is, the pre-eminent, the G.o.d-like, Man."

Who need dispute over the stories of the "miracles" wrought by Him and His disciples? To-day, no scientific person would say they were impossible; we have learned too much of the power of "mind" over "matter," for that, by now. There were well-attested marvels in all ages, and in our own living day, which were not less "miraculous" than the Gospel miracles. Therefore, they would not reject the story of Jesus because He was affirmed to have worked many signs and wonders.

The Sermon on the Mount, therefore, was a piece of practical politics which was epitomised in the saying "Love one another." The clear and definite statements which Jesus made then ought to obtain to-day in their literal letter. The equally clear and definite statements which Jesus made as to His own Divine Origin were the misty utterances of a "medium"! The Incarnation was not a fact.

"Love one another" was the supreme rule of conduct--which made it odd and bewildering that the young man who had given up everything should be covertly a.s.sailed for holding fast to the name in which he had been born. But the duke steeled himself. He honestly realised that cla.s.s hatred must still exist for generations and generations. It was not the fault of one cla.s.s, or the other, it was the inevitable inheritance of blood. Yet he found himself less harsh in spirit than most of those who forgot his sacrifices, and grudged him his habits of speaking in decent English, of courteous manner, of taste, of careful attention to his finger nails. To his sorrow he found that many of them still hated him for these things--despite everything they hated him. For his part he merely disliked, not them, but the absence in them of these things. But from the first he found his way was hard and that his renunciation was a renunciation indeed. He threw himself into the whole Socialistic movement with enormous energy, but his personal consolations were found in the sympathy and society of people like the Roses, and their set--cultured and brilliant men and women who were, after all was said and done, "Gentlefolk born!"

After his marriage, months had been taken up with the legal business, protracted and beset with every sort of difficulty, by which he had devised his vast properties to the movement.

He was much criticised for retaining a modest sum of two thousand pounds a year for himself and his wife--until James Fabian Rose with a pen dipped in vitriol and a tongue like a whip of steel neatly flayed the objectors and finished them off with a few characteristic touches of his impish Irish wit.

Then--would he go to court?--a down-trodden working-man couldn't go to court. If he was going to be a Socialist, let him be a Socialist--and so on.

For this sort of thing, again, the duke did not care. The only critic and judge of his actions was himself, his conscience. He went to court, Mary was presented also. They were kindly received. High minds can appreciate highmindedness, however much the point of view may differ.

Mary was two things. First of all she was the d.u.c.h.ess of Paddington. It was made quite plain to her that, though perhaps she was not the d.u.c.h.ess for whom many people had hoped, she was indubitably of the rank.

Gracious words were said to her as d.u.c.h.ess. Even kinder words were said to her upon another and more private occasion, as one of those great artists whom Royalty has always been delighted to honour--recognising a sovereignty quite alien to its own but still real!

As for the duke, he had a certain privilege at the levees. It belonged to his house. It was his right to stand a few paces behind the Lord Chamberlain, and when any representatives of the n.o.ble family of ---- appeared before the Sovereign, to draw his court sword and step near to the King--an old historic custom the reasons for which were nearly forgotten, but which was still part of the pomp and pageantry of the Royal palace.

Upon one occasion after his renunciation, he appeared at St. James's and exercised his ancient right. There was no opposition, nothing unkind, upon the faces of any of the great persons there. The ceremony was gone through with all its traditional dignity, but every one there felt that it was an a.s.sertion--and a farewell! The duke himself knew it at the time, and as he left St. James's he may be pardoned if, for a moment, old memories arose in him, and that his eyes were dimmed with a mist of unshed tears as the modest brougham drove him back to his house in Cheyne Walk. How kind they had all been! How sympathetic in their way, _how highly bred_! Yes! it was worth while to be one of them! It was worth while to live up to the traditions which so many of them often forgot. But one could still do that, one could still keep the old hereditary chivalry of race secret and inviolable in the soul, and yet live for the people, love the poor, the outcast, the noisy, the vulgar, those whom Our Lord, who counselled tribute to reason, loved best of all!... These things are an indication, not a history of the events of the first eighteen months after the Duke of Paddington's marriage.

The story provides a glimpse into some of his difficulties, that is to say, difficulties which were semi-public and patent to his intimate circle of friends, if not, perhaps, to all the rest of the world.

Nevertheless, giving all that he had given, he found himself confronted with yet another problem, which was certainly the worst of all. He had married Mary, he loved her and reverenced her as he thought no man had ever reverenced and loved a girl before. She loved and appreciated him also. Theirs was a perfect welding and fusion of ident.i.ty and hopes. But she was an actress. Her love for her Art had been direct and overwhelming from the very first. She had given all her life and talent to it. For her it had all the sacredness of a real vocation. She was, and always would be, a woman vowed to her Art as truly and strongly as an innocent maiden puts on the black veil and vows herself to Christ.

Nor is this a wrong comparison, because there are very many ways of doing things to the glory of G.o.d, and G.o.d gives divers gifts to divers of his children. And so this also had to be faced by the duke. Since the night upon which her great opportunity had come to her, Mary had never looked back.

Her success, then, had been supreme and overwhelming, and, apart from all the romantic circ.u.mstances which had attended it, her position upon the stage had grown into one which was entirely apart from anything outside her Art.

The world now--after five years--still knew that she was a d.u.c.h.ess--if she chose, that was how the world put it--but the fact had little or no significance for the public. She was just Mary Marriott--their own Mary--and if she so often spent her genius in interpreting the brilliant socialistic plays of James Fabian Rose--well, what of that? They went to see her play in the plays, not, in the first instance, to see the play itself. And even after that, Rose was always charming--there was always a surprise and a delightfully subversive point of view. One went home to Bayswater and West Kensington "full of new ideas," and certainly full of enthusiasm for beautiful Mary Marriott. "What a darling she is, mother!"

... "Charming indeed, Gertie. And do not forget that she is, after all, the d.u.c.h.ess of Paddington. Of course the duke gave up his fortune to the Socialists some years ago, but they are still quite wealthy. Maud knows them. Your Aunt Maud was there to an afternoon reception only last week.

Every one was there. All the leading lights! They have renounced society, of course, but quite a lot of the best people pop in all the same--so your Aunt Maud tells me--and, of course, all the leading painters and actors and writers, and so on. And, of course, they can go anywhere they like directly they give up this amusing socialistic pose.

They're even asked down to Windsor. The King tolerates the young duke with his mad notions, and of course Miss Marriott is received on other grounds too--like Melba and Patti and Irving, don't you know. Nothing like real Art, Gertie! It takes you anywhere." Such statements as these were only half true. Every one came to the duke's house who was any one in the world of Art. But they came to see his wife, not to see him. And despite the rumours of Bayswater his own cla.s.s left him severely alone by now. The years had pa.s.sed, his property was no longer his, he had very definitely "dropped out." The duke did not care for "artistic"

people, and he knew that they didn't care for him. He could not understand them, and on their part they thought him dull and uninteresting. There was no common ground upon which they could meet.

Many of the people who came were actors and actresses, and when it had been agreed between Mary and her husband that she was to continue her artistic career, he had not contemplated the continual invasion and interruption of his home life which this was to mean. He had a prodigious admiration for Mary's talent; it had seemed, and still seemed, to him the most wonderful thing in the world. His ideal had been from the first a life of n.o.ble endeavour for the good of the world. He had given up everything he held dear, and would spend the rest of his life in active service for the cause of Socialism. Mary would devote her supreme art to the same cause. But there would also be a hidden, happy life of love and ident.i.ty of aim which would be perfect. They had done exactly as he had proposed. His enthusiasm for the abstract idea of Socialism had never grown less--was stronger than ever now. Mary's earnestness and devotion was no less than his. In both of them the flame burned pure and brightly still.

But the duke knew by this time that nothing had turned out as he expected and hoped. His home life was non-existent. His work was incessant, but the Cause seemed to be making no progress whatever. It remained where it had stood when he had just made his great renunciation.

The vested interests of Property were too strong. A Liberal and semi-socialistic government had tried hard, but had somehow made a mess of things. The House of Lords had refused its a.s.sent to half a dozen bills, and its members had only smiled tolerantly at the Duke of Paddington's fervid speeches in favour of the measures which were sent up from the Lower House. And worse than this, the duke saw, the Socialists saw, every one saw, that the country was in thorough sympathy with the other party, that at the next general election the Conservatives would be returned by an overwhelming majority. And there was one other thing, a personal, but very real thing, which contributed to the young man's general sense of weariness and futility of endeavour.

He loved his wife with the same dogged and pa.s.sionate devotion with which he had won her. He knew well that her own love for him was as strong as ever. But, as far as she was concerned, there was so little time or opportunity for an expression of it. She was a public woman, a star of the first rank in Art and in affairs. Her day was occupied in rehearsals at the theatre or in public appearances upon the socialistic platform. Her nights were exercised in the practice of her Art upon the stage.

Sometimes he went to see his wife act, but his pride and joy in her achievement was always tempered and partly spoiled by a curious--but very natural--_physical_ jealousy which he was quite unable to subdue.

It offended and wounded all his instincts to see some painted posing actor holding _his_ own wife--the d.u.c.h.ess of Paddington!--in his arms and making a pretended love to her. It was all pretence, of course; it was simply part of the inevitable mechanism of "Art" ("Oh, _d.a.m.n_ Art,"

he would sometimes say to himself very heartily), but it was beastly all the same. He had to meet the actor-men in private life. First with surprise, and then with a disgust for which he had no name, he watched their self-consciousness of pose, their invincible absorption in a petty self, their straining efforts to appear as gentlemen, their failure to convince any one but their own cla.s.s that they were real human beings at all--that they were any more than empty sh.e.l.ls into which the personality of this or that creative genius nightly poured the stuff that made the puppets work. No doubt his ideas were all wrong and distorted. But they were very real, and ever present with him. Nor was it nice to know that any horrid-minded rascal with a few shillings in his fob could buy the nightly right to sit and gloat over Mary's charm, Mary's beauty. It was a violation of his inherited beliefs and impulses, though, if it had been another man's wife, and not his own, he would probably not have cared in the least!

So the Duke of Paddington sat in the library of his house in Chelsea. It was a Sat.u.r.day afternoon. There was a matinee, and Mary had rushed off after an early lunch. The duke felt very much alone. He had no particular engagement that afternoon. His correspondence he had finished during the morning, and he was now a little at a loss how to occupy his time. At the moment life seemed rather hollow and empty, the very aspect of his comfortable room was somehow distasteful, and, though he did not feel ill, he had a definite sensation of physical mis-ease.

"I must have some exercise," he thought to himself. "I suppose it's a touch of liver."

He debated whether he should go to the German gymnasium for an hour, to swim at the Bath Club, or merely to walk through the town. He decided for the walk. Thought and pedestrianism went well together, and the other two alternatives were not conducive to thought. He wanted to think. He wanted to examine his own sensations, to a.n.a.lyse the state of his mind, to find out from himself and for himself if he really _were_ unhappy and dissatisfied with his life, if he had made a frightful mistake or no. It was late autumn. The weather was neither warm nor cold. There was no fog nor rain, but everything was grey and cheerless of aspect. The sky was leaden, and there was a peculiar and almost sinister lividity in the wan light of the afternoon.

He walked along the Embankment dreamily enough. The movement was pleasant--he had certainly not taken enough exercise lately!--and he tried to postpone the hour of thought, the facing of the question.

When he had crossed the head of the Vauxhall Bridge road, and traversed the rather dingy purlieus of Horseferry, he came out by the Lords'

entrance to the Houses of Parliament. The Victoria Tower in all its marvellous modern beauty rose up into the sky, white and incredibly ma.s.sive against the background of grey. The house was sitting, so he saw from the distant, drooping flag above; but it was many months now since he had ventured into the Upper Chamber. As he came along his heart suddenly began to beat more rapidly than usual, and his face flushed a little. A small brougham just set down the Archbishop of Canterbury as the duke arrived at the door--the man whom in the past he had known so well and liked so much, Lord Camborne, to whose daughter the duke had been engaged--Lord Camborne, older now, stooping a little, but no less dignified and serene. Time had not robbed the bishop and earl of any of his stateliness of port, and the Primate of All England was still one of the most striking figures of the day.

He turned and saw the duke. The two men had never met nor spoken since the day upon which the younger had told of his new convictions. The archbishop hesitated for a moment. His fine old face grew red, and then paled again; there was a momentary flicker of indecision about the firm, proud mouth. Then he held out his hand, with a smile, but a smile in which there was a great deal of sadness.

"Ah, John!" he said, shaking his venerable head. "Ah, John! so we meet again after all these years. How are you? Happy, I hope?--G.o.d bless you, my dear fellow."

A pang, like a spear-thrust, traversed the young man's heart as he took that revered and trembling hand.

"I am well, your Grace," he said slowly, "and I'm happy."

"Thank G.o.d for it," returned the archbishop, "Who has preserved your Grace"--he put a special and sorrowful accent upon the form of address the younger man shared with him--"for His own purposes, and has given you _His_ grace! as I believe and hope."

And then, something kindly and human coming into his face and voice, the ceremonial gone from both, he said: "Dear boy, years ago I never thought that we should meet like this--as duke and as archbishop. I hoped that you would have called me father! And since dear Hayle's death ... Well, I am a lonely old man now, John. My daughter has other interests. I am not long for this world. I spend the last of my years in doing what I can for England, according to the light within me. As you do also, John, I don't doubt it. Good-bye, good-bye--I am a little late as it is. Pray, as I pray, that we may all meet in Heaven."

And with these last kindly words the old man went away, and the Duke of Paddington never saw him again, for in five months he was dead and the Church mourned a wise and courtly prelate.

The duke went on. Melancholy filled his mind. He never heard a voice now like that of the man he had just left. It brought back many memories of the past. He wasn't among the great of the world any more. The people who filled his house in Chelsea were clever and charming no doubt. But they weren't _his_ people. He had departed from the land of his inheritance. He was no longer a prince and a ruler among rulers and princes. The waters of Babylon were not as those of Israel, and in his heart he wept.

... It was to be an afternoon of strain and stress. As he went up Parliament Street towards Trafalgar Square he met a long line of miserable sandwich men. Upon their wooden tabards he saw his wife's name "KING'S THEATRE--MISS MARY MARRIOTT'S HUNDREDTH NIGHT," and so forth.

And as he turned into Pall Mall--for half unconsciously his feet were leading him to a club in St. James's Street to which he still belonged--he received another shock.

A victoria drove rapidly down the street of clubs, and in it, lovely and incomparable in her young matronhood, sat the Marchioness of Dover, Constance Camborne that had been, now the supreme leader and arbitrix of Vanity Fair. She saw him, she recognised him, and he knew it. But she made no sign, not a muscle of her face relaxed as the carriage whirled by. Once more the duke felt very much alone.

He went into the club--it was the famous old Cocoa Tree--sat down and began to read the evening papers. He lay back upon the circular seat of padded crimson leather that surrounds the central column of the Tree itself. Few people were in the club this afternoon, and as he glanced upwards to where the chocolate-coloured column disappears through the high Georgian ceiling, a sense came to him that he was surrounded by the shades of those august personalities who had thronged this exclusive place of memories in the past--Lord Byron, Gibbon; farther back, Lord Alvanley, Beau Brummell, and the royal dukes of the Regency. Their pictures hung upon the walls--peers, statesmen, royalties, they all seemed crowding out of the frames, and to be pressing upon him now.

Stately figures all and each, ghostly figures of men who had lived and died in many ways, well or ill, but all people who had _ruled_--men of his own caste and clan.

He was overwrought and tired. His imagination, never a very insistent quality with him, was roused by the physical dejection of his nerves to an unusual activity. And in the back of his brain was the remembrances of recent meetings--the meeting with the Primate who might have been his father-in-law; the meeting with the radiant and high-bred young woman whose husband he himself might have been.

... A grave servant in the club's livery came up to him, with a pencilled memorandum upon a silver tray.

"This has just come through by telephone, your Grace," he said. "The telephone boy did not know that your Grace was in the house, or he would have called you. As it was the boy took down the message." This was the message: