"Look here, Arthur!--can"t you make a last effort, and get free?"
His companion threw him a queer resentful look, but Lester persisted:
"You know what I think. You won"t make each other happy. You belong to two worlds which won"t and can"t mix. Her friends can never be your friends nor your friends hers. You think that doesn"t matter now, because you"re in love. But it does matter--and it"ll tell more and more every year."
"Don"t I know it?" cried Arthur. "She despises us all. She looks upon us all--I mean, us people, with land and money and big houses--just as so much grist to her father"s mill, so many fat cattle for him to slaughter."
"And yet you love her!"
"Of course I do! I can"t make you understand, Lester! She doesn"t speechify about these things--she never speechifies to me, at least. She mocks at her own side--just as much as ours. But it"s her father she worships--and everything that he says and thinks. She adores him--she"d go to the stake for him any day. And if you want to be a friend of hers, lay a finger on him, and you"ll see! Of course it"s mad--I know that. But I"d rather marry her mad than any other woman sane!"
"All the same you _could_ break it off," persisted Lester.
"Of course I could. I could hang--or poison--or shoot myself, I suppose, if it comes to that. It would be much the same thing. If I do have to give her up, I shall cut the whole business--Parliament--estates--everything!"
The quarter-decking began again; and Lester waited patiently on a slowly subsiding frenzy. At last he put a question.
"What are your chances?"
"With her? I don"t know. She encourages me one day, and snubs me the next.
But one thing I do know. If I attend that meeting, and make the sort of speech I should have made three months ago without turning a hair--and if I don"t make it, mother will know the reason why!--it"s all up with me."
"Why don"t you apply to Coryston?"
"What--to give up the other meeting? He"s very likely to climb down, isn"t he?--with his d.a.m.ned revolutionary nonsense. He warned us all that he was coming down here to make mischief--and, by Jove, he"s doing it!"
"I say, who"s taking my name in vain?" said a high-pitched voice.
Lester turned to the doorway, and beheld a protruding head, with glittering greenish eyes, alive with laughter. Coryston slowly emerged, and closed the door behind him.
"Arthur, my boy, what"s up now?"
Arthur paused, looked at him angrily, but was too sore and sulky to reply. Lester mildly summarized the situation. Coryston whistled. Then he deposited the b.u.t.terfly-net and tin case he had been carrying, accepted a cigarette, and hoisting himself onto the corner of a heavy wooden pedestal which held the periwigged bust of an eighteenth-century Coryston, he flung an arm affectionately round the bust"s neck, and sat cross-legged, smoking and pondering.
"Bar the meeting for a bit," he said at last, addressing his brother; "we"ll come back to it. But meeting or no meeting, I don"t see any way out for you, Arthur--upon my soul, I don"t!"
"No one ever supposed you would!" cried Arthur.
"Here"s your dilemma," pursued Coryston, good-humoredly. "If you engage yourself to her, mother will cut off the supplies. And if mother cuts off the supplies, Miss Glenwilliam won"t have you."
"You think everybody but yourself, Corry, mercenary pigs!"
"What do _you_ think? Do you see Miss Glenwilliam pursuing love in a garret--a genteel garret--on a thousand a year? For her father, perhaps!--but for n.o.body else! Her clothes alone would cost a third of it."
No reply, except a furious glance. Coryston began to look perturbed. He descended from his perch, and approaching the still pacing Arthur, he took his arm--an attention to which the younger brother barely submitted.
"Look here, old boy? Am I becoming a beast? Are you sure of her? Is it serious?"
"Sure of her? Good G.o.d--if I were!"
He walked to a window near, and stood looking out, so that his face could not be seen by his companions, his hands in his pockets.
Coryston"s eyebrows went up; the eyes beneath them showed a genuine concern. Refusing a further pull at Lester"s cigarettes, he took a pipe out of his pocket, lit it, and puffed away in a brown study. The figure at the window remained motionless. Lester felt the situation too delicate for an outsider"s interference, and made a feint of returning to his work.
Presently it seemed that Coryston made up his mind.
"Well," he said, slowly, "all right. I"ll cut my meeting. I can get Atherstone to take the chair, and make some excuse. But I really don"t know that it"ll help you much. There"s already an announcement of your meeting in the Martover paper yesterday--"
"_No_!" Arthur faced round upon his brother, his cheeks blazing.
"Perfectly true. Mother"s taken time by the forelock. I have no doubt she has already written your speech."
"What on earth can I do?" He stood in helpless despair.
"Have a row!" said Coryston, laughing. "A good row and stick to it! Tell mother you won"t be treated so--that you"re a man, not a school-boy--that you prefer, with many thanks, to write your own speeches--_et cetera_.
Play the independence card for all you"re worth. It _may_ get you out of the mess."
Arthur"s countenance began to clear.
"I"m to make it appear a bargain--between you and me? I asked you to give up your show, and you--"
"Oh, any lies you like," said Coryston, placidly. "But as I"ve already warned you, it won"t help you long."
"One gains a bit of time," said the young lover, in a tone of depression.
"What"s the good of it? In a year"s time Glenwilliam will still be Glenwilliam--and mother mother. Of course you know you"ll break her heart--and that kind of thing. Marcia made me promise to put that before you. So I do. It"s perfectly true; though I don"t know that I am the person to press it! But then mother and I have always disagreed--whereas _you_ have been the model son."
Angry melancholy swooped once more upon Arthur.
"What the deuce have women to do with politics! Why can"t they leave the rotten things to us? Life won"t be worth living if they go on like this!"
""_Life_,"" echoed Coryston, with amused contempt. "Your life? Just try offering your billet--with all its little worries thrown in--to the next fellow you meet in the street--and see what happens!"
But the man in Arthur rebelled. He faced his brother.
"If you think that I wouldn"t give up this whole show to-morrow"--he waved his hand toward the marble forecourt outside, now glistening in the sun--"for--for Enid--you never made a greater mistake in your life, Corry!"
There was a bitter and pa.s.sionate accent in the voice which carried conviction. Coryston"s expression changed.
"Unfortunately, it wouldn"t help you with--with Enid--to give it up," he said, quietly. "Miss Glenwilliam, as I read her--I don"t mean anything in the least offensive--has a very just and accurate idea of the value of money."
A sort of impatient groan was the only reply.
But Lester raised his head from his book.
"Why don"t you see what Miss Coryston can do?" he asked, looking from one to the other.
"Marcia?" cried Coryston, springing up. "By the way, what are mother and Marcia after, this Sunday? Do you suppose that business is all settled by now?"