THE PRIME MINISTER (75 page)

‘My dearest love, everybody who owes anything to anybody should always pay it. That is so self-evident that one would
almost suppose that it might be understood without being enunciated. But the virtue of paying your debts is incompatible with an absence of money. Now, if you please, we will not say anything more about Mrs Parker. She is not at any rate a fit companion for you.’

‘It was you who introduced me to her.’

‘Hold your tongue about her, – and let that be an end of it I little knew what a world of torment
I was preparing for myself when I allowed you to come and live in your father’s house.’

When the Session began it was understood in the political world that a very strong opposition was to be organized against the Government under the guidance of Sir Orlando Drought, and that the great sin to
be imputed to the Cabinet was an utter indifference to the safety and honour of Great Britain, as manifested by their neglect of the navy.
All the world knew that Sir Orlando had deserted the Coalition because he was not allowed to build new ships, and of course Sir Orlando would make the most of his grievance. With him was joined Mr Boffin, the patriotic Conservative who had never listened to the voice of the seducer, and the staunch remainder of the old Tory party. And with them the more violent of the Radicals were prepared to act,
not desirous, indeed, that new ships should be built, or that a Conservative Government should be established, – or, indeed, that anything should be done, – but animated by intense disgust that so mild a politician as the Duke of Omnium should be Prime Minister. The fight began at once, Sir Orlando objecting violently to certain passages in the Queen’s Speech. It was all very well to say that the
country was at present at peace with all the world; but how was peace to be maintained without a fleet’ Then Sir Orlando paid a great many compliments to the Duke, and ended his speech by declaring him to be the most absolutely faineant minister that had disgraced the country since the days of the Duke of Newcastle.
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Mr Monk defended the Coalition, and assured the House that the navy was not
only the most powerful navy existing, but that it was the most powerful that ever had existed in the possession of this or any other country, and was probably in absolute efficiency superior to the combined navies of all the world. The House was not shocked by statements so absolutely at variance with each other, coming from two gentlemen who had lately been members of the same Government, and who
must be supposed to know what they were talking about, but seemed to think that upon the whole Sir Orlando had done his duty. For though there was complete confidence in the navy as a navy, and though a very small minority would have voted for any considerably increased expense, still it was well that there should be an opposition. And how can there be an opposition without some subject for grumbling,
– some matter on which a minister may be attacked? No one really thought that the Prussians and French combined would invade our shores and devastate our fields, and plunder London, and carry our daughters away into captivity. The state of the funds showed very plainly that there was no such fear. But a good cry is a very good thing, – and it is always
well to rub up the officials of the Admiralty
by a little wholesome abuse. Sir Orlando was thought to have done his business well. Of course he did not risk a division upon the address. Had he done so he would have been ‘nowhere’. But, as it was, he was proud of his achievement.

The ministers generally would have been indifferent to the very hard words that were said of them, knowing what they were worth, and feeling aware that a ministry
which had everything too easy must lose its interest in the country, had it not been that their chief was very sore on the subject The old Duke’s work at this time consisted almost all together in nursing the younger Duke. It did sometimes occur to his elder Grace that it might be well to let his brother retire, and that a Prime Minister,
malgré lui,
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could not be a successful Prime Minister,
or a useful one. But if the Duke of Omnium went the Coalition must go too, and the Coalition had been the offspring of the old statesman. The country was thriving under the Coalition, and there was no real reason why it should not last for the next ten years. He continued, therefore, his system of coddling, and was ready at any moment, or at every moment, to pour, if not comfort, at any rate consolation
into the ears of his unhappy friend. In the present emergency, it was the falsehood and general baseness of Sir Orlando which nearly broke the heart of the Prime Minister. ‘How is one to live,’ he said, ‘if one has to do with men of that kind?’

‘But you haven’t to do with him any longer,’ said the Duke of St Bungay.

‘When I see a man who is supposed to have earned the name of a statesman, and
been high in the councils of his sovereign, induced by personal jealousy to do as he is doing, it makes me feel that an honest man should not place himself where he may have to deal with such persons.’

‘According to that the honest men are to desert their country in order that the dishonest men may have everything their own way.’ Our Duke could not answer this, and therefore for the moment he
yielded. But he was unhappy, saturnine, and generally silent except when closeted with his ancient mentor. And he knew that he was saturnine and silent, and that it behoved him as a leader of men to be genial and communicative, – listening to counsel even if he did
not follow it, and at any rate appearing to have confidence in his colleagues.

During this time Mr Slide was not inactive, and in
his heart of hearts the Prime Minister was more afraid of Mr Slide’s attacks than of those made upon him by Sir Orlando Drought. Now that Parliament was sitting, and the minds of men were stirred to political feeling by the renewed energy of the House, a great deal was being said in many quarters about the last Silverbridge election. The papers had taken the matter up generally, some accusing thze
Prime Minister and some defending. But the defence was almost as unpalatable to him as the accusation. It was admitted on all sides that the Duke, both as a peer and as a Prime Minister, should have abstained from any interference whatever in the election. And it was also admitted on all sides that he had not so abstained, – if there was any truth at all in the allegation that he had paid money
for Mr Lopez. But it was pleaded on his behalf that the Dukes of Omnium had always interfered at Silverbridge, and that no Reform Bill had ever had any effect in reducing their influence in that borough. Frequent allusion was made to the cautious Dod
¹⁴
who, year after year, had reported that the Duke of Omnium exercised considerable influence in the borough. And then the friendly newspapers went
on to explain that the Duke had in this instance stayed his hand, and that the money, if paid at all, had been paid because the candidate who was to have been his nominee had been thrown over, when the Duke at the last moment made up his mind that he would abandon the privilege which had hitherto been always exercised by the head of his family, and which had been exercised more than once or twice
in his own favour. But Mr Slide, day after day, repeated his question, ‘We want to know whether the Prime Minister did or did not pay the election expenses of Mr Lopez at the last Silverbridge election; and if so, why he paid them. We shall continue to ask this question till it has been answered, and when asking it we again say that the actual correspondence on the subject between the Duke and
Mr Lopez is in our own hands.’ And then, after a while, allusions were made to the Duchess; – for Mr Slide had learned all the facts of the case from Lopez himself. When Mr Slide found how hard it was ‘to draw his badger’, as he expressed himself concerning his own operations, he at last openly alluded to the Duchess, running the risk of
any punishment that might fall upon him by action for libel
or by severe reprehension from his colleagues of the Press. ‘We have as yet,’ he said, ‘received no answers to the questions which we have felt ourselves called upon to ask in reference to the conduct of the Prime Minister at the Silverbridge election. We are of opinion that all interference by peers with the constituencies of the country should be put down by the strong hand of the law as thoroughly
and unmercifully as we are putting down ordinary bribery. But when the offending peer is also the Prime Minister of this great country, it becomes doubly the duty of those who watch over the public safety,’ – Mr Slide was always speaking of himself as watching over the public safety, – ‘to animadvert upon his crime till it has been assoiled, or at any rate repented. From what we now hear we
have reason to believe that the crime itself is acknowledged. Had the payment on behalf of Mr Lopez not been made, – as it certainly was made, or the letters in our hand would be impudent forgeries, – the charge would long since have been denied. Silence in such a matter amounts to confession. But we understand that the Duke intends to escape under the plea that he has a second self, powerful as
he is to exercise the baneful influence which his territorial wealth unfortunately gives him, but for the actions of which second self he, as a Peer of Parliament and as Prime Minister, is not responsible. In other words we are informed that the privilege belonging to the Palliser family at Silverbridge was exercised, not by the Duke himself, but by the Duchess; – and that the Duke paid the money
when he found that the Duchess had promised more than she could perform. We should hardly have thought that even a man so notoriously weak as the Duke of Omnuim would have endeavoured to ride out of responsibility by throwing the blame upon his wife; but he will certainly find that the attempt, if made, will fail.

‘Against the Duchess herself we wish to say not a word. She is known as exercising
a wide if not a discriminate hospitality. We believe her to be a kind-hearted, bustling, ambitious lady, to whom any little faults may be easily forgiven on account of her good-nature and generosity. But we cannot accept her indiscretion as an excuse for a most unconstitutional act performed by the Prime Minister of this country.’

Latterly the Duchess had taken in her own copy of the
People’s
Banner.
Since she had found that those around her were endeavouring to keep from her what was being said of her husband in regard to the borough, she had been determined to see it all. She therefore read the article from which two or three paragraphs have just been given, – and having read it she handed it to her friend Mrs Finn. ‘I wonder that you trouble yourself with such trash,’ her friend
said to her.

‘That is all very well, my dear, for you; but we poor wretches who are the slaves of the people have to regard what is said of us in the
People’s Banner.’

‘It would be much better for you to neglect it.’

‘Just as authors are told not to read the criticisms; – but I never would believe any author who told me that he didn’t read what was said about him. I wonder when the man found
out that I was good-natured. He wouldn’t find me good-natured if I could get hold of him.’

‘You are not going to allow it to torment you!’

‘For my own sake, not a moment. I fancy that if I might be permitted to have my own way I could answer him very easily: Indeed with these dregs of the newspapers, these gutter-slanderers, if one would be open and say all the truth aloud, what would one have
to fear? After all, what is it that I did? I disobeyed my husband because I thought that he was too scrupulous. Let me say as much, out loud to the public, – saying also that I am sorry for it, as I am, – and who would be against me? Who would have a word to say after that? I should be the most popular woman in England for a month, – and, as regards Plantagenet, Mr Slide and his articles would
all sink into silence. But even though he were to continue this from day to day for a twelvemonth it would not hurt me, – but that I know how it scorches him. This mention of my name will make it more intolerable to him than ever. I doubt that you know him even yet.’

‘I thought that I did.’

‘Though in manner he is as dry as a stick, though all his pursuits are opposite to the very idea of romance,
though he passes his days and nights in thinking how he may take a halfpenny in the pound off the taxes of the people without robbing the revenue, there is a dash of chivalry about him worthy of the old poets. To him a woman, particularly his own woman, is a thing so fine and so precious that the winds of heaven should hardly be allowed to blow upon her.
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He
cannot bear to think that people should
even talk of his wife. And yet, heaven knows, poor fellow, I have given people occasion enough to talk of me. And he has a much higher chivalry than that of the old poets. They, or their heroes, watched their women because they did not want to have trouble about them, – shut them up in castles, kept them in ignorance, and held them as far as they could out of harm’s way.’

‘I hardly think they
succeeded,’ said Mrs Finn.

‘But in pure selfishness they tried all they could. But he is too proud to watch. If you and I were hatching treason against him in the dark, and chance had brought him there, he would stop his ears with his fingers. He is all trust, even when he knows that he is being deceived. He is honour complete from head to foot. Ah, it was before you knew me when I tried him
the hardest. I never could quite tell you that story, and I won’t try it now; but he behaved like a god. I could never tell him what I felt, – but I felt it.’

‘You ought to love him.’

‘I do; – but what’s the use of it? He is a god, but I am not a goddess; – and then, though he is a god, he is a dry, silent, uncongenial and uncomfortable god. It would have suited me much better to have married
a sinner. But then the sinner that I would have married was so irredeemable a scapegrace.’

‘I do not believe in a woman marrying a bad man in the hope of making him good.’

‘Especially not when the woman is naturally inclined to evil herself. It will half kill him when he reads all this about me. He has read it already, and it has already half killed him. For myself I do not mind it in the least,
but for his sake I mind it much. It will rob him of his only possible answer to the accusation. The very thing which this wretch in the newspaper says he will say, and that he will be disgraced by saying, is the very thing that he ought to say. And there would be no disgrace in it, – beyond what I might well bear for my little fault, and which I could bear so easily.’