"I hope you have trusted me in thus giving me the command of your fortune?"
"Oh, yes."
"I do believe that you have. I need hardly say that I could not have stood for this last election without it; and I must try to make you understand that if I had not come forward at this vacancy, I should have stood no chance for the next; otherwise, I should not have been justified in paying so dearly for a seat for one session. You can understand that; eh, Alice?"
"Yes; I think so?
"Anybody, even your father, would tell you that; though, probably, he regards my ambition to be a Member of Parliament as a sign of downright madness. But I was obliged to stand now, if I intended to go on with it, as that old lord died so inopportunely. Well, about the money! It is quite upon the cards that I may be forced to ask for another loan when the autumn comes."
"You shall have it, George."
"Thanks, Alice. And now I will tell you what I propose. You know that I have been reconciled,--with a sort of reconciliation,--to my grandfather? Well, when the next affair is over, I propose to tell him exactly how you and I then stand."
"Do not go into that now, George. It is enough for you at present to be a.s.sured that such a.s.sistance as I can give you is at your command.
I want you to feel the full joy of your success, and you will do so more thoroughly if you will banish all these money troubles from your mind for a while."
"They shall, at any rate, be banished while I am with you," said he.
"There; let them go!" And he lifted up his right hand, and blew at the tips of his fingers. "Let them vanish," said he. "It is always well to be rid of such troubles for a time."
It is well to be rid of them at any time, or at all times, if only they can be banished without danger. But when a man has overused his liver till it will not act for him any longer, it is not well for him to resolve that he will forget the weakness of his organ just as he sits down to dinner.
It was a pretty bit of acting, that of Vavasor"s, when he blew away his cares; and, upon the whole, I do not know that he could have done better. But Alice saw through it, and he knew that she did so.
The whole thing was uncomfortable to him, except the fact that he had the promise of her further moneys. But he did not intend to rest satisfied with this. He must extract from her some meed of approbation, some show of sympathy, some spark of affection, true or pretended, in order that he might at least affect to be satisfied, and be enabled to speak of the future without open embarra.s.sment. How could even he take her money from her, unless he might presume that he stood with her upon some ground that belonged mutually to them both?
"I have already taken my seat," said he.
"Yes; I saw that in the newspapers. My acquaintance among Members of Parliament is very small, but I see that you were introduced, as they call it, by one of the few men that I do know. Is Mr. Bott a friend of yours?"
"No,--certainly not a friend. I may probably have to act with him in public."
"Ah, that"s just what they said of Mr. Palliser when they felt ashamed of his having such a man as his guest. I think if I were in public life I should try to act with people that I could like."
"Then you dislike Mr. Bott?"
"I do not like him, but my feelings about him are not violent."
"He is a vulgar a.s.s," said George, "with no more pretensions to rank himself a gentleman than your footman."
"If I had one."
"But he will get on in Parliament, to a certain extent."
"I"m afraid I don"t quite understand what are the requisites for Parliamentary success, or indeed of what it consists. Is his ambition, do you suppose, the same as yours?"
"His ambition, I take it, does not go beyond a desire to be Parliamentary flunkey to a big man,--with wages, if possible, but without, if the wages are impossible."
"And yours?"
"Oh, as to mine;--there are some things, Alice, that a man does not tell to any one."
"Are there? They must be very terrible things."
"The schoolboy, when he sits down to make his rhymes, dares not say, even to his sister, that he hopes to rival Milton; but he nurses such a hope. The preacher, when he preaches his sermon, does not whisper, even to his wife, his belief that thousands may perhaps be turned to repentance by the strength of his words; but he thinks that the thousand converts are possible."
"And you, though you will not say so, intend to rival Chatham, and to make your thousand converts in politics."
"I like to hear you laugh at me,--I do, indeed. It does me good to hear your voice again with some touch of satire in it. It brings back the old days,--the days to which I hope we may soon revert without pain. Shall it not be so, dearest?"
Her playful manner at once deserted her. Why had he made this foolish attempt to be tender? "I do not know," she said, gloomily.
For a few minutes he sat silent, fingering some article belonging to her which was lying on the table. It was a small steel paper-knife, of which the handle was cast and gilt; a thing of no great value, of which the price may have been five shillings. He sat with it, pa.s.sing it through his fingers, while she went on with her work.
"Who gave you this paper-cutter?" he said, suddenly.
"Goodness me, why do you ask? and especially, why do you ask in that way?"
"I asked simply because if it is a present to you from any one, I will take up something else."
"It was given me by Mr. Grey."
He let it drop from his fingers on to the table with a noise, and then pushed it from him, so that it fell on the other side, near to where she sat.
"George," she said, as she stooped and picked it up, "your violence is unreasonable; pray do not repeat it."
"I did not mean it," he said, "and I beg your pardon. I was simply unfortunate in the article I selected. And who gave you this?" In saying which he took up a little ivory foot-rule that was folded up so as to bring it within the compa.s.s of three inches.
"It so happens that no one gave me that; I bought it at a stupid bazaar."
"Then this will do. You shall give it me as a present, on the renewal of our love."
"It is too poor a thing to give," said she, speaking still more gloomily than she had done before.
"By no means; nothing is too poor, if given in that way. Anything will do; a ribbon, a glove, a broken sixpence. Will you give me something that I may take, and, taking it, may know that your heart is given with it?"
"Take the rule, if you please," she said.
"And about the heart?" he asked.
He should have been more of a rascal or less. Seeing how very much of a rascal he was already, I think it would have been better that he should have been more,--that he should have been able to content his spirit with the simple acquisition of her money, and that he should have been free from all those remains of a finer feeling which made him desire her love also. But it was not so. It was necessary for his comfort that she should, at any rate, say she loved him. "Well, Alice, and what about the heart?" he asked again.
"I would so much rather talk about politics, George," said she.
The cicatrice began to make itself very visible in his face, and the debonair manner was fast vanishing. He had fixed his eyes upon her, and had inserted his thumbs in the armholes of his waistcoat.
"Alice, that is not quite fair," he said.
"I do not mean to be unfair."