Kitabı oku: «Lord Kilgobbin», sayfa 14

CHAPTER XXIV

TWO FRIENDS AT BREAKFAST

Irishmen may reasonably enough travel for climate, they need scarcely go abroad in search of scenery. Within even a very short distance from the capital, there are landscapes which, for form, outline, and colour, equal some of the most celebrated spots of continental beauty.

One of these is the view from Bray Head over the wide expanse of the Bay of Dublin, with Howth and Lambay in the far distance. Nearer at hand lies the sweep of that graceful shore to Killiney, with the Dalky Islands dotting the calm sea; while inland, in wild confusion, are grouped the Wicklow Mountains, massive with wood and teeming with a rich luxuriance.

When sunlight and stillness spread colour over the blue mirror of the sea – as is essential to the scene – I know of nothing, not even Naples or Amalfi, can surpass this marvellous picture.

It was on a terrace that commanded this view that Walpole and Atlee sat at breakfast on a calm autumnal morning; the white-sailed boats scarcely creeping over their shadows; and the whole scene, in its silence and softened effect, presenting a picture of almost rapturous tranquillity.

‘With half-a-dozen days like this,’ said Atlee, as he smoked his cigarette, in a sort of languid grace, ‘one would not say O’Connell was wrong in his glowing admiration for Irish scenery. If I were to awake every day for a week to this, I suspect I should grow somewhat crazy myself about the green island.’

‘And dash the description with a little treason too,’ said the other superciliously. ‘I have always remarked the ingenious connection with which Irishmen bind up a love of the picturesque with a hate of the Saxon.’

‘Why not? They are bound together in the same romance. Can you look on the Parthenon and not think of the Turk?’

‘Apropos of the Turk,’ said the other, laying his hand on a folded letter which lay before him, ‘here’s a long letter from Lord Danesbury about that wearisome “Eastern question,” as they call the ten thousand issues that await the solution of the Bosporus. Do you take interest in these things.’

‘Immensely. After I have blown myself with a sharp burst on home politics, I always take a canter among the Druses and the Lebanites; and I am such an authority on the “Grand Idea,” that Rangabe refers to me as “the illustrious statesman whose writings relieve England from the stain of universal ignorance about Greece.”’

‘And do you know anything on the subject?’

‘About as much as the present Cabinet does of Ireland. I know all the clap-traps: the grand traditions that have sunk down into a present barbarism – of course, through ill government; the noble instincts depraved by gross usage; I know the inherent love of freedom we cherish, which makes men resent rents as well as laws, and teaches that taxes are as great a tyranny as the rights of property.’

‘And do the Greeks take this view of it?’

‘Of course they do; and it was in experimenting on them that your great Ministers learned how to deal with Ireland. There was but one step from Thebes to Tipperary. Corfu was “pacified” – that’s the phrase for it – by abolishing the landlords. The peasants were told they might spare a little if they liked to the ancient possessor of the soil; and so they took the ground, and they gave him the olive-trees. You may imagine how fertile these were, when the soil around them was utilised to the last fraction of productiveness.’

‘Is that a fair statement of the case?’

‘Can you ask the question? I’ll show it to you in print.’

‘Perhaps written by yourself?’

‘And why not? What convictions have not broken on my mind by reading my own writings? You smile at this; but how do you know your face is clean till you look in a glass?’

Walpole, however, had ceased to attend to the speaker, and was deeply engaged with the letter before him.

‘I see here,’ cried he, ‘his Excellency is good enough to say that some mark of royal favour might be advantageously extended to those Kilgobbin people, in recognition of their heroic defence. What should it be, is the question.’

‘Confer on him the peerage, perhaps.’

‘That is totally out of the question.’

‘It was Kate Kearney made the defence; why not give her a commission in the army? – make it another “woman’s right.”’

‘You are absurd, Mr. Atlee.’

‘Suppose you endowed her out of the Consolidated Fund? Give her twenty thousand pounds, and I can almost assure you that a very clever fellow I know will marry her.’

‘A strange reward for good conduct.’

‘A prize of virtue. They have that sort of thing in France, and they say it gives a great support to purity of morals.’

‘Young Kearney might accept something, if we knew what to offer him.’

‘I’d say a pair of black trousers; for I think I’m now wearing his last in that line.’

‘Mr. Atlee,’ said the other grimly, ‘let me remind you once again, that the habit of light jesting —persiflage– is so essentially Irish, you should keep it for your countrymen; and if you persist in supposing the career of a private secretary suits you, this is an incongruity that will totally unfit you for the walk.’

‘I am sure you know your countrymen, sir, and I am grateful for the rebuke.’

Walpole’s cheek flushed at this, and it was plain that there was a hidden meaning in the words which he felt, and resented.

‘I do not know,’ continued Walpole, ‘if I am not asking you to curb one of the strongest impulses of your disposition; but it rests entirely with yourself whether my counsel be worth following.’

‘Of course it is, sir. I shall follow your advice to the letter, and keep all my good spirits and my bad manners for my countrymen.’

It was evident that Walpole had to exercise some strong self-control not to reply sharply; but he refrained, and turned once more to Lord Danesbury’s letter, in which he was soon deeply occupied. At last he said: ‘His Excellency wants to send me out to Turkey to confer with a man with whom he has some confidential relations. It is quite impossible that, in my present state of health, I could do this. Would the thing suit you, Atlee – that is, if, on consideration, I should opine that you would suit it?’

‘I suspect,’ replied Atlee, but with every deference in his manner, ‘if you would entertain the last part of the contingency first, it would be more convenient to each of us. I mean whether I were fit for the situation.’

‘Well, perhaps so,’ said the other carelessly; ‘it is not at all impossible, it may be one of the things you would acquit yourself well in. It is a sort of exercise for tact and discretion – an occasion in which that light hand of yours would have a field for employment, and that acute skill in which I know you pride yourself as regards reading character – ’

‘You have certainly piqued my curiosity,’ said Atlee.

‘I don’t know that I ought to have said so much; for, after all, it remains to be seen whether Lord Danesbury would estimate these gifts of yours as highly as I do. What I think of doing is this: I shall send you over to his Excellency in your capacity as my own private secretary, to explain how unfit I am in my present disabled condition to undertake a journey. I shall tell my lord how useful I have found your services with regard to Ireland, how much you know of the country and the people, and how worthy of trust I have found your information and your opinions; and I shall hint – but only hint, remember – that, for the mission he speaks of, he might possibly do worse than fix upon yourself. As, of course, it rests with him to be like-minded with me or not upon this matter – to take, in fact, his own estimate of Mr. Atlee from his own experiences of him – you are not to know anything whatever of this project till his Excellency thinks proper to open it to you. You understand that?’

‘Thoroughly.’

‘Your mission will be to explain – when asked to explain – certain difficulties of Irish life and habits, and if his lordship should direct conversation to topics of the East, to be careful to know nothing of the subject whatever – mind that.’

‘I shall be careful. I have read the Arabian Nights– but that’s all.’

‘And of that tendency to small joking and weak epigram I would also caution you to beware; they will have no success in the quarter to which you are going, and they will only damage other qualities which you might possibly rely on.’

Atlee bowed a submissive acquiescence.

‘I don’t know that you’ll see Lady Maude Bickerstaffe, his lordship’s niece.’ He stopped as if he had unwittingly uttered an awkwardness, and then added – ‘I mean she has not been well, and may not appear while you are at the castle; but if you should – and if, which is not at all likely, but still possible, you should be led to talk of Kilgobbin and the incident that has got into the papers, you must be very guarded in all you say. It is a county family of station and repute. We were there as visitors. The ladies – I don’t know that I ‘d say very much of the ladies.’

‘Except that they were exceedingly plain in looks, and somewhat passées besides,’ added Atlee gravely.

‘I don’t see why you should say that, sir,’ replied the other stiffly. ‘If you are not bent on compromising me by an indiscretion, I don’t perceive the necessity of involving me in a falsehood.’

‘You shall be perfectly safe in my hands,’ said Atlee.

‘And that I may be so, say as little about me as you can. I know the injunction has its difficulties, Mr. Atlee, but pray try and observe it.’

The conversation had now arrived at a point in which one angry word more must have produced a rupture between them; and though Atlee took in the whole situation and its consequences at a glance, there was nothing in the easy jauntiness of his manner that gave any clue to a sense of anxiety or discomfort.

‘Is it likely,’ asked he at length, ‘that his Excellency will advert to the idea of recognising or rewarding these people for their brave defence?’

‘I am coming to that, if you will spare me a little patience: Saxon slowness is a blemish you’ll have to grow accustomed to. If Lord Danesbury should know that you are an acquaintance of the Kilgobbin family, and ask you what would be a suitable mode of showing how their conduct has been appreciated in a high quarter, you should be prepared with an answer.’

Atlee’s eyes twinkled with a malicious drollery, and he had to bite his lips to repress an impertinence that seemed almost to master his prudence, and at last he said carelessly —

‘Dick Kearney might get something.’

‘I suppose you know that his qualifications will be tested. You bear that in mind, I hope – ’

‘Yes. I was just turning it over in my head, and I thought the best thing to do would be to make him a Civil Service Commissioner. They are the only people taken on trust.’

‘You are severe, Mr. Atlee. Have these gentlemen earned this dislike on your part?’

‘Do you mean by having rejected me? No, that they have not. I believe I could have survived that; and if, however, they had come to the point of telling me that they were content with my acquirements, and what is called “passed me,” I fervently believe I should have been seized with an apoplexy.’

‘Mr. Atlee’s opinion of himself is not a mean one,’ said Walpole, with a cold smile.

‘On the contrary, sir, I have occasion to feel pretty often in every twenty-four hours what an ignominious part a man plays in life who has to affect to be taught what he knows already – to be asking the road where he has travelled every step of the way – and to feel that a threadbare coat and broken boots take more from the value of his opinions than if he were a knave or a blackleg.’

‘I don’t see the humility of all this.’

‘I feel the shame of it, though,’ said Atlee; and as he arose and walked out upon the terrace, the veins in his forehead were swelled and knotted, and his lips trembled with suppressed passion.

In a tone that showed how thoroughly indifferent he felt to the other’s irritation, Walpole went on to say: ‘You will then make it your business, Mr. Atlee, to ascertain in what way most acceptable to those people at Kilgobbin his Excellency may be able to show them some mark of royal favour – bearing in mind not to commit yourself to anything that may raise great expectations. In fact, a recognition is what is intended, not a reward.’

Atlee’s eyes fell upon the opal ring, which he always wore since the day Walpole had given it to him, and there was something so significant in the glance that the other flushed as he caught it.

‘I believe I appreciate the distinction,’ said Atlee quietly. ‘It is to be something in which the generosity of the donor is more commemorated than the merits of the person rewarded, and, consequently, a most appropriate recognition of the Celt by the Saxon. Do you think I ought to go down to Kilgobbin Castle, sir?’

‘I am not quite sure about that; I’ll turn it over in my mind. Meanwhile I’ll telegraph to my lord that, if he approves, I shall send you over to Wales; and you had better make what arrangements you have to make, to be ready to start at a moment.’

‘Unfortunately, sir, I have none. I am in the full enjoyment of such complete destitution, that I am always ready to go anywhere.’

Walpole did not notice the words, but arose and walked over to a writing-table to compose his message for the telegraph.

‘There,’ said he, as he folded it, ‘have the kindness to despatch this at once, and do not be out of the way about five, or half-past, when I shall expect an answer.’

‘Am I free to go into town meanwhile?’ asked Atlee.

Walpole nodded assent without speaking.

‘I wonder if this sort of flunkeydom be good for a man,’ muttered Atlee to himself as he sprang down the stairs. ‘I begin to doubt it. At all events, I understand now the secret of the first lieutenant’s being a tyrant: he has once been a middy. And so I say, let me only reach the ward-room, and Heaven help the cockpit!’

CHAPTER XXV

ATLEE’S EMBARRASSMENTS

When Atlee returned to dress for dinner, he was sent for hurriedly by Walpole, who told him that Lord Danesbury’s answer had arrived with the order, ‘Send him over at once, and write fully at the same time.’

‘There is an eleven o’clock packet, Atlee, to-night,’ said he: ‘you must manage to start by that. You’ll reach Holyhead by four or thereabouts, and can easily get to the castle by mid-day.’

‘I wish I had had a little more time,’ muttered the other. ‘If I am to present myself before his Excellency in such a “rig” as this – ’

‘I have thought of that. We are nearly of the same size and build; you are, perhaps, a trifle taller, but nothing to signify. Now Buckmaster has just sent me a mass of things of all sorts from town; they are in my dressing-room, not yet unpacked. Go up and look at them after dinner: take what suits you – as much – all, if you like – but don’t delay now. It only wants a few minutes of seven o’clock.’

Atlee muttered his thanks hastily, and went his way. If there was a thoughtfulness in the generosity of this action, the mode in which it was performed – the measured coldness of the words – the look of impassive examination that accompanied them, and the abstention from anything that savoured of apology for a liberty – were all deeply felt by the other.

It was true, Walpole had often heard him tell of the freedom with which he had treated Dick Kearney’s wardrobe, and how poor Dick was scarcely sure he could call an article of dress his own, whenever Joe had been the first to go out into the town. The innumerable straits to which he reduced that unlucky chum, who had actually to deposit a dinner-suit at an hotel to save it from Atlee’s rapacity, had amused Walpole; but then these things were all done in the spirit of the honest familiarity that prevailed between them – the tie of true camaraderie that neither suggested a thought of obligation on one side nor of painful inferiority on the other. Here it was totally different. These men did not live together with that daily interchange of liberties which, with all their passing contentions, so accustom people to each other’s humours as to establish the soundest and strongest of all friendships. Walpole had adopted Atlee because he found him useful in a variety of ways. He was adroit, ready-witted, and intelligent; a half-explanation sufficed with him on anything – a mere hint was enough to give him for an interview or a reply. He read people readily, and rarely failed to profit by the knowledge. Strange as it may seem, the great blemish of his manner – his snobbery – Walpole rather liked than disliked it. I was a sort of qualifying element that satisfied him, as though it said, ‘With all that fellow’s cleverness, he is not “one of us.” He might make a wittier reply, or write a smarter note; but society has its little tests – not one of which he could respond to.’ And this was an inferiority Walpole loved to cherish and was pleased to think over.

Atlee felt that Walpole might, with very little exercise of courtesy, have dealt more considerately by him.

‘I’m not exactly a valet,’ muttered he to himself, ‘to whom a man flings a waistcoat as he chucks a shilling to a porter. I am more than Mr. Walpole’s equal in many things, which are not accidents of fortune.’

He knew scores of things he could do better than him; indeed, there were very few he could not.

Poor Joe was not, however, aware that it was in the ‘not doing’ lay Walpole’s secret of superiority; that the inborn sense of abstention is the great distinguishing element of the class Walpole belonged to; and he might harass himself for ever, and yet never guess where it was that the distinction evaded him.

Atlee’s manner at dinner was unusually cold and silent. He habitually made the chief efforts of conversation, now he spoke little and seldom. When Walpole talked, it was in that careless discursive way it was his wont to discuss matters with a familiar. He often put questions, and as often went on without waiting for the answers.

As they sat over the dessert and were alone, he adverted to the other’s mission, throwing out little hints, and cautions as to manner, which Atlee listened to in perfect silence, and without the slightest sign that could indicate the feeling they produced.

‘You are going into a new country, Atlee,’ said he at last, ‘and I am sure you will not be sorry to learn something of the geography.’

‘Though it may mar a little of the adventure,’ said the other, smiling.

‘Ah, that’s exactly what I want to warn you against. With us in England, there are none of those social vicissitudes you are used to here. The game of life is played gravely, quietly, and calmly. There are no brilliant successes of bold talkers, no coups de théâtre of amusing raconteurs: no one tries to push himself into any position of eminence.’

A half-movement of impatience, as Atlee pushed his wine-glass before him, arrested the speaker.

‘I perceive,’ said he stiffly, ‘you regard my counsels as unnecessary.’

‘Not that, sir, so much as hopeless,’ rejoined the other coldly.

‘His Excellency will ask you, probably, some questions about this country: let me warn you not to give him Irish answers.’

‘I don’t think I understand you, sir.’

‘I mean, don’t deal in any exaggerations, avoid extravagance, and never be slapdash.’

‘Oh, these are Irish, then?’

Without deigning reply to this, Walpole went on —

‘Of course you have your remedy for all the evils of Ireland. I never met an Irishman who had not. But I beg you spare his lordship your theory, whatever it is, and simply answer the questions he will ask you.’

‘I will try, sir,’ was the meek reply.

‘Above all things, let me warn you against a favourite blunder of your countrymen. Don’t endeavour to explain peculiarities of action in this country by singularities of race or origin; don’t try to make out that there are special points of view held that are unknown on the other side of the Channel, or that there are other differences between the two peoples, except such as more rags and greater wretchedness produce. We have got over that very venerable and time-honoured blunder, and do not endeavour to revive it.’

‘Indeed!’

‘Fact, I assure you. It is possible in some remote country-house to chance upon some antiquated Tory who still cherishes these notions; but you’ll not find them amongst men of mind or intelligence, nor amongst any class of our people.’

It was on Atlee’s lip to ask, ‘Who were our people?’ but he forbore by a mighty effort, and was silent.

‘I don’t know if I have any other cautions to give you. Do you?’

‘No, sir. I could not even have reminded you of these, if you had not yourself remembered them.’

‘Oh, I had almost forgotten it. If his Excellency should give you anything to write out, or to copy, don’t smoke while you are over it: he abhors tobacco. I should have given you a warning to be equally careful as regards Lady Maude’s sensibilities; but, on the whole, I suspect you’ll scarcely see her.’

‘Is that all, sir?’ said the other, rising.

‘Well, I think so. I shall be curious to hear how you acquit yourself – how you get on with his Excellency, and how he takes you; and you must write it all to me. Ain’t you much too early? it’s scarcely ten o’clock.’

‘A quarter past ten; and I have some miles to drive to Kingstown.’

‘And not yet packed, perhaps?’ said the other listlessly.

‘No, sir; nothing ready.’

‘Oh! you’ll be in ample time; I’ll vouch for it. You are one of the rough-and-ready order, who are never late. Not but in this same flurry of yours you have made me forget something I know I had to say; and you tell me you can’t remember it?’

‘No, sir.’

‘And yet,’ said the other sententiously, ‘the crowning merit of a private secretary is exactly that sort of memory. Your intellects, if properly trained, should be the complement of your chief’s. The infinite number of things that are too small and too insignificant for him, are to have their place, duly docketed and dated, in your brain; and the very expression of his face should be an indication to you of what he is looking for and yet cannot remember. Do you mark me?’

‘Half-past ten,’ cried Atlee, as the clock chimed on the mantel-piece; and he hurried away without another word.

It was only as he saw the pitiable penury of his own scanty wardrobe that he could persuade himself to accept of Walpole’s offer.

‘After all,’ he said, ‘the loan of a dress-coat may be the turning-point of a whole destiny. Junot sold all he had to buy a sword, to make his first campaign; all I have is my shame, and here it goes for a suit of clothes!’ And, with these words, he rushed down to Walpole’s dressing-room, and not taking time to inspect and select the contents, carried off the box, as it was, with him. ‘I’ll tell him all when I write,’ muttered he, as he drove away.