The Testing of Diana Mallory, Mrs. Humphry Ward [e book reader online TXT] 📗

out of the Government. Nevertheless, the scale of life had dropped--on the wrong side. Through Lankester's thought there shot a pang of sympathy. Defeat was always more winning to him than triumph.

* * * * *

Meanwhile the new member himself was in no melting mood. Forbes was right. Marsham, in his room, looking over the letters which his servant had brought him, was only conscious of two feelings--disgust and loathing with regard to the contest just over, and a dogged determination with regard to the future. He had been deserted by the moderates--by the Ferrierites--in spite of all his endeavors to keep within courteous and judicial bounds; and he had been all but sacrificed to a forbearance which had not saved him apparently a single moderate vote, and had lost him scores on the advanced side.

With regard to Ferrier personally, he was extremely sore, A letter from him during the preceding week would certainly have influenced votes. Marsham denied hotly that his speeches had been of a character to offend or injure his old friend and leader. A man must really be allowed some honest latitude of opinion, even under party government!--and in circumstances of personal obligation. He had had to steer a most difficult course. But why must he give up his principles--not to speak of his chances of political advancement--because John Ferrier had originally procured him his seat in Parliament, and had been his parents' intimate friend for many years? Let the Whig deserters answer that question, if they could!

His whole being was tingling with anger and resentment. The contest had steeped him in humiliations which stuck to him like mud-stains.

The week before, he had written to Ferrier, imploring him if possible to come and speak for him--or at least to write a letter; humbling his pride; and giving elaborate explanations of the line which he had taken.

There, on the table beside him, was Ferrier's reply:

"My Dear Oliver,--I don't think a letter would do you much good, and for a speech, I am too tired--and I am afraid at the present moment too thin-skinned. Pray excuse me. We shall meet when this hubbub is over. All success to you.

"Yours ever, J.F."

Was there ever a more ungracious, a more uncalled-for, letter? Well, at any rate, he was free henceforward to think and act for himself, and on public grounds only; though of course he would do nothing unworthy of an old friendship, or calculated to hurt his mother's feelings. Ferrier, by this letter, and by the strong negative influence he must have exerted in West Brookshire during the election, had himself loosened the old bond; and Marsham would henceforth stand on his own feet.

As to Ferrier's reasons for a course of action so wholly unlike any he had ever yet taken in the case of Lucy Marsham's son, Oliver's thoughts found themselves engaged in a sore and perpetual wrangle. Ferrier, he supposed, suspected him of a lack of "straightness"; and did not care to maintain an intimate relation, which had been already, and might be again, used against him. Marsham, on his side, recalled with discomfort various small incidents in the House of Commons which might have seemed--to an enemy--to illustrate or confirm such an explanation of the state of things.

Absurd, of course! He _was_ an old friend of Ferrier's, whose relation to his mother necessarily involved close and frequent contact with her son. And at the same time--although in the past Ferrier had no doubt laid him under great personal and political obligations--he had by now, in the natural course of things, developed strong opinions of his own, especially as to the conduct of party affairs in the House of Commons; opinions which were not Ferrier's--which were, indeed, vehemently opposed to Ferrier's. In his, Oliver's, opinion, Ferrier's lead in the House--on certain questions--was a lead of weakness, making for disaster. Was he not even to hold, much less to express such a view, because of the quasi-parental relation in which Ferrier had once stood to him? The whole thing was an odious confusion--most unfair to him individually--between personal and Parliamentary duty.

Frankness?--loyalty? It would, no doubt, be said that Ferrier had always behaved with singular generosity both toward opponents and toward dissidents in his own party. Open and serious argument was at no time unwelcome to him.

All very well! But how was one to argue, beyond a certain point, with a man twenty-five years your senior, who had known you in jackets, and was also your political chief?

Moreover, he had argued--to the best of his ability. Ferrier had written him a striking series of letters, no doubt, and he had replied to them. As to Ferrier's wish that he should communicate certain points in those letters to Barton and Lankester, he had done it, to some extent. But it was a most useless proceeding. The arguments employed had been considered and rejected a hundred times already by every member of the dissident group.

And with regard to the meeting, which had apparently roused so sharp a resentment in Ferrier, Marsham maintained simply that he was not responsible. It was a meeting of the advanced Radicals of the division. Neither Marsham nor his agents had been present. Certain remarks and opinions of his own had been quoted indeed, even in public, as leading up to it, and justifying it. A great mistake. He had never meant to countenance any personal attack on Ferrier or his leadership. Yet he uncomfortably admitted that the meeting had told badly on the election. In the view of one side, he had not had pluck enough to go to it; in the view of the other, he had disgracefully connived at it.

* * * * *

The arrival of the evening post and papers did something to brush away these dismal self-communings. Wonderful news from the counties! The success of the latest batch of advanced candidates had been astonishing. Other men, it seemed, had been free to liberate their souls! Well, now the arbiter of the situation was Lord Philip, and there would certainly be a strong advanced infusion in the new Ministry. Marsham considered that he had as good claims as any of the younger men; and if it came to another election in Brookshire, hateful as the prospect was, he should be fighting in the open, and choosing his own weapons. No shirking! His whole being gathered itself into a passionate determination to retaliate upon the persons who had injured, thwarted, and calumniated him during the contest just over. He would fight again--next week, if necessary--and he would win!

As to the particular and personal calumnies with which he had been assailed--why, of course, he absolved Diana. She could have had no hand in them.

Suddenly he pushed his papers from him with a hasty unconscious movement.

In driving home that evening past the gates and plantations of Beechcote it seemed to him that he had seen through the trees--in the distance--the fluttering of a white dress. Had the news of his inglorious success just reached her? How had she received it? Her face came before him--the frank eyes--the sweet troubled look.

He dropped his head upon his arms. A sick distaste for all that he had been doing and thinking rose upon him, wavelike, drowning for a moment the energies of mind and will. Had anything been worth while--for _him_--since the day when he had failed to keep the last tryst which Diana had offered him?

He did not, however, long allow himself a weakness which he knew well he had no right to indulge. He roused himself abruptly, took pen and paper, and wrote a little note to Alicia, sending it round to her through her maid.

* * * * *

Marsham pleaded fatigue, and dined in his room. In the course of the meal he inquired of his servant if Mr. Barrington had arrived.

"Yes, sir; he arrived in time for dinner."

"Ask him to come up afterward and see me here."

As he awaited the new-comer, Marsham had time to ponder what this visit of a self-invited guest might mean. The support of the _Herald_ and its brilliant editor had been so far one of Ferrier's chief assets. But there had been some signs of wavering in its columns lately, especially on two important questions likely to occupy the new Ministry in its first session--matters on which the opinion of the Darcy, or advanced section, was understood to be in violent conflict with that of Ferrier and the senior members of the late Front Opposition Bench in general.

Barrington, no doubt, wished to pump him--one of Ferrier's intimates--with regard to the latest phase of Ferrier's views on these two principal measures. The leader himself was rather stiff and old-fashioned with regard to journalists--gave too little information where other men gave too much.

Oliver glanced in some disquiet at the pile of Ferrier's letters lying beside him. It contained material for which any ambitious journalist, at the present juncture, would give the eyes out of his head. But could Barrington be trusted? Oliver vaguely remembered some stories to his disadvantage, told probably by Lankester, who in these respects was one of the most scrupulous of men. Yet the paper stood high, and was certainly written with conspicuous ability.

Why not give him information?--cautiously, of course, and with discretion. What harm could it do--to Ferrier or any one else? The party was torn by dissensions; and the first and most necessary step toward reunion was that Ferrier's aims and methods should be thoroughly understood. No doubt in these letters, as he had himself pointed out, he had expressed himself with complete, even dangerous freedom. But there was not going to be any question of putting them into Barrington's hands. Certainly not!--merely a quotation--a reference here and there.

As he began to sketch his own share in the expected conversation, a pleasant feeling of self-importance crept in, soothing to the wounds of the preceding week. Secretly Marsham knew that he had never yet made the mark in politics that he had hoped to make, that his abilities entitled him to make. The more he thought of it the more he realized that the coming half-hour might be of great significance in English politics; he had it in his own power to make it so. He was conscious of a strong wish to impress Barrington--perhaps Ferrier also. After all, a man grows up, and does not remain an Eton boy, or an undergraduate, forever. It would be well to make Ferrier more aware than he was of that fact.

In the midst of his thoughts the door opened, and Barrington--a man showing in his dark-skinned, large-featured alertness the signs of Jewish pliancy and intelligence--walked in.

"Are you up to conversation?" he said, laughing. "You look pretty done!"

"If I can whisper you what you want," said Oliver, huskily, "it's at your service! There are the cigarettes."

The talk lasted long. Midnight was near