TALES AND SKETCHES.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 6090, 29 January 1898, Page 1

TALES AND SKETCHES.

THE FIGHT FOR THE CROWN. [By W. E. Noßßis.j Author of "My Friend £im," "Misadventure," "Marcia," "Baffled Conspirators," <f Matrfmony," '\ Saint Ann's," "ADancer in Yellov," "No New Thing," &c, &o. {All Eights fleservetf.) C«A?T?R, XV. A FRBLIMItfABY CANTBR. That in return for his sage advice he irould be advised, politely or rudely, by letter to mind his own business was only what Wilfrid felt, \ypoa reflection, that he must expect. He had, no doubt, taken a liberty, and could not fairly complain of being snubbed for his pains ; but such treatment he was prepared to accept, provided only that he achieved his purpose of giving Nora pause. What, however, he" was not, oddly enough, prepared for was that most chilling and effective of all snubs which is administered by absolute silence, and it must be owned that he was a sore and angry man when it became evident that Miss Power did not mean to honour him Trith any reply, good, bad, or indifferent. Nor did he again meet Lord Southfield, as he was somewhat irritably and foolishly anxious to do. ' " My brother," Lady Virginia said, in response to tentative inquiries, " isn't much Of a London man, and even when he is in London, he ■prefers to associate with impossible people. I don't suppose we shall Bee any more of him, and I am sure I don't know what has become of him. Are you afraid that he has flown back to the f eot of your Kathleen Mavourneen ? You needn't be afraid ; he is like the sailor who had a wife in every port, and it must be somebody else's turn to dispose of him now." " I am sure," Wilfrid returned, a little resentfully, "that my Kathleen Mavourneen, as you call her, can have no wish to dispose of him. ' She isn't an impossible person." "Then ahe doesn't resemble you; for you have moments, I am sorry to say, ■which make me doubt your possibility. I mean, of course, aa a Parliamentary candidate." But she had really no valid excuse for doubting him in that capacity. It had now been formally arranged that he was to Bolicit the electors* suffrages in the newly^ constituted Heckingley division— Mr Jessop having announced his intention of withdrawing from public lif& — and he was ready, he said, to obey the orders of his chiefs, some of whom seemed ready, on their side, to gratify the aspirations of the extreme Eadical wing. The Parliament of 189(K-that Parliament of large promises and small performances— was at its last gasp, as also was the sway of the vast, stolid middle class, which for close upon half a century had dictated the policy of this Empire. " And a good thing, too !" Lady Virginia declared. " A despotism isn't a bad form of government, though I think a republic iB better; but no self-respecting person ought, to be asked to place his neck under the splay feet of the bourgeoisie. Henceforth we are going to be a pure; democracy, and those who want to come to the front will have to prove themselves pure democrats, Sear that in mind, please/ Wilfrid promised to bear it m mind. He was in all sincerity a democrat to the extent of being opposed to all class privileges, and as regarded the question which chiefly pre-occupied his instructress, he was inclined to be with her — certain reservations apart, Hers was, at all events, a gonerous point of view. The only difficulty was how to share it and at the same time denounce the Tories, who were governing Ireland without exceptional legislation and in apparent concert with Irish representatives. He mentioned this little difficulty to her ladyship, who assured him that it would Cease to exist long before the general election. " Whatever it may suit them to pretend for the moment, they are slave-drivers at heart," she averred, "and they daren't offer much. Nothing like as much as we shall end by offering. The thing for you to do when you talk to your future constituents, will be to take time by the forelock and aay outright that you' are in favour of Home Eule." "That would be going a little beyond my instructions," Wilfrid observed. w Well, why shouldn't you make yourself famous by going beyond your instructions ? I rather want you to be fainou^ you know." " From the moment that you want anything/you are pretty sura to got it," said Wilfrid. " Personally, lam not ambitious but if fame is to be obtained, and if you can be pleased upon such comparatively easy terms, who am Ito lay back my ears ? I'll try to be as preposterous as yoti will doubtless order me to be." Lady Virginia remarked that that was both pretty and sensible of him. He was in truth, anxious to please her and was flattered by the interest that she expressed in hia future career. After the" slap io. the face which he had received from one quarter, it was but natural that he should be especially amenable to cajolery proceeding from another. He accordingly required no pressing to make Heckingloy House his head quarters during the preliminary canter prescribed for him, and if ; at certain meetings which followed, he said any preposterous things, he' had the consolation of knowing that the intellectual calibre of His audience rendered his utterances quite unimportant. All he had to do— so tho partially convalescent Mr Jes3op, who was kind enough to assist his candidature informed him— wasto proclaim his adherence to every plank in the Eadical platform and to talk vaguely about the nationalisation of tho land. Hia bucolic auditors listened to him with dull patience and obvious lack of interest, seldom applauding, and usually winding up the proceedings with "Three cheers for the Grand Old Man." He was not called upon to say much about Ireland, nor did it matter in the least what his views with regard to foreign policy might be His- opponent, Mr Mildmay, was a pleasant-mannered country gentleman, who was rather languidly fighting a losino- battle because nobody else would nndertake the expense, and who was upon the best of terms with his friend and neighbour, Lady Virginia ; there was evidently going to be no trouble at all about tho forthcoming contest. I It did not, perhaps, follow that no troubles would result from his. acquiescence in the wishes and commands of a lady who, as he had truly remarked, generally managed to get what she wanted. What, he sometimes wondered lid she really want him to do, beyond ultimately voting in the House of Commons with the party to which he belonged? A touch of " perverse naughtiness prompted him one more than that," ahe returned " can Virginia want of you ? It's impossible togueßS ! But of course, as yousay, she must wantsomething, or she wouldn t make as much of you as she does. Is it, cic 'you think, that she wishes to make some smau return to you for your blind adoration ot her ?" "Blind adoration!" echoed WilM". a little startled. " You put the case ratuer strongly."

"Do I? Then suppose we call it reapeetful Admiration. Virginia is accustomed to arousing both sentiments, and it's only fair to her to admit that she always tries to reward them to the best of her powers. But what particular reward she has in store for you, except hospitality and the gift of this seat in Parliament, which you would probable rather, be without, I don't at present quite see." Yet she must surely have seen what was so patent ! She had, indeed, virtually intimated long ere this that she was aware of the intentions of her relatives, and that she did not mind, for the sake ' of peace, lending some apparent encouragement to designs which were destined to come to nothing. If she had not meant to intimate that — but the alternative demanded closer scrutiny than there was time to bestow upon it. " Are you," Wilfrid hastily and bluntly inquired, " accusing me of having fallen in love with your sister ?" " Oh ! no," was the girl's, calm reply. " You couldn't, I am sure, fall in love with anybody if you tried ; and you certainly won't be so unwise as to try. But you will hardly, I should think, go sp far as to pretend that you are herfe now for anything or anybody but Virginia," "Of course," answered Wilfrid; "it wouldn't have occurred to me to stand for this particular constituency if I hadn't been promised Lady Virginia's support. Why do you say I am incapable of falling in love ? Am Iso abnormal ?" Lady Laura .shrugged her shoulders lazily. " That sort of incapacity isn't a bit abnormal," she declared. " I rather think — though I can't be quite sure — that I suffer from it myself, Everybody has fancies. I may have a fancy for — for whom shall I say ? — f or some Tom, Dick, or Harry. But falling in love implies an amount of wear and tear which only heroic persons can be expected to face. And you aren't exactly a hero, are you ?" This to a man who had not only been foolish enough to fall desperately in love. ' with a girl who. could not even be at the ; pains of answering his letters, but heroic ' enough to efface himself, lest peradventure ahe should be driven by force of circum- ' stances to entertain his unwelcome suit! But Wilfrid did not protest ; he only ventured to remark that if his merits were small, so were h;s pretensions. " Shake hands," said Lady Laura ; " we're in the same boat. My merits also are small ; ( but then I never said they weren't. That, 1 I trust, will be taken into consideration by my friends if I ever do anything to startle or horrify them." 1 " You won't," answered Wilfrid, who ' felt that the young lady deserved some < return for her candour. " You will never take the trouble." i But what she had said so far stuck in his ( memory as to make him wonder more than once what her meaning had been. It was ( perhaps jn her to commit some act of : surprising folly; there was really no saying what might or might not be in a person at once so reticent and .so outspoken. And then a possibility— a remote one, no doubt, | but still just a possibility — suggested itself to him which caused him first to blush ingenuously and then to* whistle. Her remarks about his admiration for her sister, her rather unkind assertion that he was no ' hero, the slightly disdainful fashion in which he sometimes caught her scrutinis- ; ing him from between half-dosed eyelids— ; did. not these things reveal a certain ani;, '< mosity,to ba accounted ,for upoa a* very ordinary hypothesis ? • ' Wilfrid Elles was not in the least a vain man, and for that very reason it came quite naturally to him to perceive that he was as ' likely as another to touch some maiden's heart. If he had won what he had not sought, while losing what he wonld have given his ears to gain, that would be only in accordance with the general perversity ' of things. Or rather, upon second thoughts, it might be a matter for congratulation. Lady Laura was charming ; his inexorable common sense forbade him to believe that < because he had been crossed in love, ho i would remain single all his days ; why not i acquiesce at once in what would, have to i be accepted sooner or later? If an unworthy desire to prove to Miss Nora that i her contemptuous view of him was not, i after all, the universal one, counted for something in this philosophic summing up '. of the situation, it is only fair to him to add that he was unconscious of being so influenced. For the re3t, Lady Virginia kept him so busy with public affairs, during the ensuing period, that he was abl^^vithout much effort to avert his gaze from private and domestic contingencies. Those were days of irresolution, and uncertainty in the Liberal camp, days of waiting for a mot d'ordre . which did not come, and of rumours which caused many a wavering politician to postpone as long as might be the possibly awkward duty of addressing his constituents. To some of these the speech of a former Irish Chief Secretary at Bradford doubtless came as an encouragement and a relief. Mr Forster, at all events, knew what programmo he was prepared to advocate and support, and stated it with characteristic lucidity. No empirical tinkering with the Land Laws, no Disestablishment just at present; above ajl, no agreement in the existing policy of governing Ireland without a Crimes Act. " The non-renewal of the Crimes Act means this: if anybody wishes to commit any agrarian offence, any outrage, or inurder,it would be almost impossible to convict. No jury would convict the culprit; It also menus this . . . that, inasmuch as the Government, with their eyes open, tave allowed the provisions against boycotting to cease, the people of Ireland will not unnaturally jump to the conclusion that it is not only legal, but pennis-* sible." ' "And so it is !" declared Lady Virginia, to whom Wilfrid read aloud the above extract from a speech which li 6 admired. " Surely, if I soil butter and eggs, I have a fight to say that I don't care to supply this or that family \" " And if you batter out the brains of this or that family, hasn't the community any right to call you to account ?" " Just as many brains are. likely to be battered out with as without a Coercion Act, but eomo people will always be safe because they have no brains to lose. What Mr Forster will lose is his election—and serve him right ! Why doesn't he call himself a Tory at once ?" " But it is the Tories who are dispensing with coercion." "Only because they are shakes in the grass and wolve3 in sheep's clothing. Give them a big majority and you will very soon see what their notions of conciliation are. But they won't get a majority, big or small. The important thing is that ours should be big— really big, I mean." ' " Lest we should bo tempted to imitate our opponents?" Lady Virginia laughed. " Every now and then," she observed, surveying him with her head a little on one side, "you bring out a rather sharp remark. I don't mean to say that you do it on purpose. Now we'll play lawn tennis." She played that game with remarkable grace and agility, almost always beating her adversary, who, perhaps, did not very much mind being beaten. .Ib was, at any rato, pleasanter and more healthy to bo defeated in that way than by arguments which did not invariably bring conviction home to him. Chapter XVI. SIB SAMUEL ASSISTS. Lady Virginia (for it was oh her account ih»si they were ordered, though, her hua-

band doubtless paid the bill) received a huge supply of newspapers every day ; so that the diligent student of the jumping cat had every opportunity, while under her roof, of prosecuting useful researches, i But newspapers of all shades of political opinion were evidently a little puzzled as to whatline their leading articles ought to take untifMrParnell, speaking at Dublin on the 24th of August, announced in so many words that what he and his colleagues aimed at, and looked forward to obtaining, was " the restoration of our own Parliament." As he went on to explain that the restored' Parliament must have complete legislative independence, that cleared the air, and enabled journalists to cry aloud that the Irish leader could not have what he demanded— which they did with pleasing unanimity. "You see,"" remarked Wilfrid to his monitress, "the moment that the thing is put before them in black and whito, Tories, Whigs, and Eadicals agree that it shall never be forced down their throats. We aren't going to give legislative independence — which is another name for separation — to Ireland; and eighty or a hundred Irish members won't be able to out-vote us." " Oh, yes they will," answered Lady Virginia, tranquilly ; " they will be able by choosing their moment, to turn out any Government, and as they know their strength they are quite right to proclaim it. You, lam afraid, are at heart au opportunist ; you would like to try whether something couldn't be done by means of compromises and half-measures ; you don't realise that the time lias gone by for that sort of thing." "I should like," Wilfrid declared, "to see the whole question placed beyond and above party squabbles. I should like the leaders on both sides to agree definitely as to what we, as a nation, can do, and what we can't, towards meeting the Irish." " Charming ! — but altogether impossible. I don't care twopence what the newspapers say; it stands to reason that eventually one side must be for Home Rule and the other against it; so I am rejoiced that Mr Paruell has put his foot down. After this, the Tories must throw him overboard." " And do you really think that we are likely to throw him a life-buoy ?" She nodded. "All in good time," she replied. "Some of us may require a little educating ; but that will come. The Irish demands are so fair, so reasonable, so palpably just, that twenty or thirty years hence people will hardly be able to . understand why we made such a prodigious fuss about conceding them." "I envy you!" said Wilfrid, with an admiring sigh. " I wish I could feel as you do!" "Nothing is more simple; yon have only to ask yourself how you would feel if you were an Irishman." " Ulster is in Ireland." " And Ulster will be represented in the Irish Parliament. Of course, there must always be a few malcontents everywhere ; but the educational process will go on in Ulster, too." t Meanwhile, it did not appear that there was any immediate prospect of the Liberal party being educated in accordance with Lady Virginia's views. Lord Hartington, addressing his constituents a few clays after Mr Parnell's Dublin speech, repudiated the idea that any party in the country would ever consent to acquire, or retain office by making terms with the Separationists; to which the Irish leader lost no time in responding: "I believe that if it be sought to make it impossible for our country to obtain the right to administer her own affairs, we shall make all other things impossible for those who strive to. bring that about." " He will only put our backs up and make us lay our ears down by such threats," Wilfrid observed. But Lady Virginia declared that it was not a threat at all — merely the statement of a fact. " Besides," she added, " what is said at the present moment doesn't count for much. Wait until after the elections." " Oh, I'm in no hurry," answered the prospective member for . the Heckingley division. ludeerl, he was very willing to wait as long as anybody wished, and to maintain the detached attitude which was most congenial to him until lie should bo forced to abandon it. But Sir Samuel Bland, who with his daughter, arrived at this juncture to join Lady Virginia's guest 3, assured Mr Elles that an open mind with regard to questions of urgency would never do. The Liberal party, Sir Samuel regretted to say, was divided into two sections. There were the Whigs, whoso recent utterances he deplored and who would end, ho feared, by drifting into the opposite camp; and there were the Eadicals, whose programme was definite, beneficent and dictated alike by the needs and the behests of the people. If he was to speak at one of Mr Elles's meetings, as he had been requested to do, he really must assume that the candidate accepted that programme in its entirety. " Oh, I've swallowed it," Wilfrid replied. " I don't say that I haven't found some of the items a little indigestible ; still, for all practical purposes, I may be said to have assimilated them.. But as for Home Eule " "Ah, Home Eule!" interrupted Sir Samuel, lifting up a pair of large, deprecating white hands— "all depends upon what is understood by Homo Rule. Upon that point it is not necessary, or even possible, to be quite definite as yet." " Lady Virginia is," Wilfrid replied. "Ah, dear Lady Virginia! But then, you see, she is not in Parliament; and that does make a difference, doc3n't it?" Sir Samuel's playful, paternal • manner in his relations with Lady Virginia somehowconveyed the impression that he lamented the disparity of years which rendered it appropriate. In private life there was an indefinable something about him to which fastidious persons were apt to take exception ; but as a platform orator he was really very good indeed, and in that capacity he kindly placed himself at tho service of a candidate who could not, in the sequel, refuse him the tribute of genuine admiration. Sir Samuel's speech at the Heckingley Town Hall was in all respects admirable— so much so that Lady Virginia estimated its worth at a gain of a hundred 'doubtful votes, more or less. He appeared to perceive at a glance what his hearers would like, and he told them with easy fluency how much he and the liadical wing would like to fulfil their aspirations. Graduated taxation, " free trade in land," allotments at reasonable rents for the agricultural labourers— all these measures he hoped to see carried iii the coming Parliament. Education also must, of course, be made free, and if the people of England should desire a State Church to be abolished, their decision would command obedience. He, for one, while yielding to no man in his respect for the clergy as a body, did not believe that the cause of true religion would or could suffer by the establishment of denominational equality. Over the "Irish- question he passed lightly; perhaps he knew that the Heckingley electors took no very profound interest in it. He observed, however, that it wa3 one of extreme iutricaey, and he would ask his audience to say whether it w.is not more likely to be brought to a satisfactory solution by the great states-

W Strange and Co.'s good tailoring [ for fit style and value is unequalled.

man who had already conferred such immense benefits upon the sister island than by those whose unvarying opposition was largely responsible for a condition of affairs which impeded all useful domestic legislation! He concluded by bestowing a benevolent blessing upon Wilfrid, " the nephew of my old friend Sir John Elles, whose services to his country and our party will be fresh in the memory of you all." It was impossible to refuse applause to a millionaire who asked nothing better than to be additionally taxed, and whoso heart so evidently beat in unison with that of his humbler fellow-subjects. But Mr Lethbridge, who, notwithstanding his Conservative principles, was present on the occasion, had no plaudits to bestow upon the speaker. " The oleaginous old humbug," he whispered to Wilfrid, "hasn't even the merit of being amusing. Now, Virginia, say what you will of her, is amusing." " She is sincere," Wilfrid answered. " Exactly so ; that's the funny part of j it. What after all could be more amusing than that Virginia should be a sincere Radical ? As for that elderly windbag, we could buy him with a peerage to-morrow if. j he were worth the price." That was doubtless an outrageous calumny; still, Wilfrid, while ready to give Sir Samuel credit for being an able, j and possibly honest, politician, could not' for the life of him understand why the man should be considered socially attractive, and both Lady Virginia and Lady Laura appeared to find him so. The latter, after sitting in a corner with him during an entire evening, was subsequently requested, not without a touch of asperity, to explain her conduct. " What in the world do you see in him — you who are bored by almost everybody?" Wilfrid asked. "He is old and fat and | vulgar ; lam not sure that he isn't imper- ! tinent into tho bargain — or inclined •to be." ■"He is all that," Lady Laura placidly agreed; "but there is this to be said for | him, that ho isn't his daughter. If I hadn't monopolised him — he loves to be monopolised in that way — the daughter would very likely have been thrown upon my hands." "Miss Bland is a plain-headed young woman," remarked Wilfrid, glancing across the room at the sofa upon which the lady in question, who certainly corresponded to that description, was sitting bolt upright; " but I should have said that she was quite harmless." "Well, no; I don't call her harmless. It isn't her fault that she has little beady eyes and a red nose ; perhaps it isn't altogether her fault that she has such an exasperating giggle when she talks ; but she represents such disagreeable things that one can't bring an unprejudised judgment to bear upon her." " How do you mean ? " "Hasn't Virginia told you that she is : destined to be oiir sister-in-law ? I thought j you were in all Virginia's secrets." I "No, indeed! " exclaimed Wilfrid, much! surprised/ "Is it possible that Lord Southfield can be engaged to be married "To that fright, were you going to say ? There's nothing impossible in his being engaged to Miss Bland ; but it isn't actually the case yet, As Virginia hasn't taken yon into her confidence, perhaps you won't tell her that I mentioned the subject; but she has quite made up her mind about it. Southfield, I believe, really must marry some- rioh woman, and, aft&r all Lady Laura shrugged her beautiful, bare shoulders and made a grimace. " Has Lord Southfield made up his mind about it ?" " I think not ; but he will end by doing as he is told. Everybody ends by obeying Virginia's orders. Even I — moi gui vous parle — can't resist her ; though I have always had the reputation of being . exceptionally obstinate." " I sincerely hope that you will prove worthy of your reputation if you are ever ordered to espouse a male Miss Bland," said Wilfrid. "Thanks. But I don't expect I shall. I told you the other day, you may remember, that I might startle and horrify my friends some fine morning." . "I didn't understand that you thought of startling us in that way." f? You took it for granted that I alluded to the opposite way ? No ; I mii3t leave that to you. I shouldn't have the gumption, even if I Avere offered the opportunity, which won't be offered to me. The wisest plan is not to care a straw what may happen ; and really, now thafe I come to think of it, I don't particularly care." A break in her voice belied her words, and Wilfrid, looking up, received a sudden shock at the discovery that her eyes were swimming in tears. " Lady Laura," he exclaimed, npon the impulse of the moment, "I wish you wouldn't mind telling me what is the matter." The effect or this appeal was to make her burst out laughing. " I can do that without the least difficulty." she replied. " The matter is simply that Southfield and I aren't rich enough to pleaso ourselves. Consequently, I suppose we shall have to please other people. It will be all tho same a hundred years hence, if not sooner." She moved away, leaving her interlocutor pensive and puzzled. Upon the whole he was disposed to revert to his original theory, which had been temporarily disturbed, and to assume that Lady Laura had lost her heart to some hopeless detrimental ; and that led him once more to the question of whether she might not learn to regard him, as he already almost regarded her, in ; the light of a very tolerable second best. Since she v,\i3 bound to" marry, and since he clearly foresaw that he must sooner O) % later do the same, would not tho reasons which they had for mutual sympathy and forbearance form a fair oucugh basis for matrimonial contentment ? A firmer basis, at any rate, than if oneof them, by ill luck, had chauued to be enamoured of the •other ? But tho question, unlike that of his political creed, did not press for au immediate answer. He hud it aside, in order to rub his hands metaphorically over the prospect of seeing poor Lord SouthCeld lead snub-nosed little Miss Bland to the altar. Lord Southfield, to be sure, was not the man to allow his menus plaisirs to be interfered with by such an incidental change in his condition; but then Nora Power was assuredly not the girl to let a married man make love to her. Miss. Bland, therefore might be wished every success in her presumable ambition to wear a Countess's coronet. An invitation to a shooting lodge in the Highlands, which arrived by the next morning s post, seemed to Wilfrid to have come just in the nick of time. He asked Lady Virginia whether she thought he might take a holiday and she replied/after consideration, that she saw no reason why heshouldnt. J "Of course, you will come back to us when the real campaign opens, but for the present I daresay the electors have seen enough of you. Did you say that it was to Aberdeenshire that you were go ;^ oAhecountry; kick S^^^ most particular y to stay with us no™ and to-day he writes to say he can't manage it. b Her ladyship seemed to bea'eooddeal "You may tell hi m 'f rom ma i „ ,

"You will always find me ready to come when I am called," Wilfrid remarked. She laughed. "Ah— l wonder ! But nobody is calling you just now, so you may run away and play." (To be continued.)