The Testing of Diana Mallory - Mrs. Humphry Ward (novels to read for beginners txt) 📗

before the two men separated.

* * * * *

The news of Marsham's election reached Ferrier under Sir James Chide's roof, in the pleasant furnished house about four miles from Beechcote, of which he had lately become the tenant in order to be near Diana. It was conveyed in a letter from Lady Lucy, of which the conclusion ran as follows:

"It is so strange not to have you here this evening--not to be able to talk over with you all these anxieties and trials. I can't help being a little angry with Sir James. We are the oldest friends.

"Of course I have often been anxious lately lest Oliver should have done anything to offend you. I have spoken to him about that tiresome meeting, and I think I could prove to you it was _not_ his fault. Do, my dear friend, come here as soon as you can, and let me explain to you whatever may have seemed wrong. You cannot think how much we miss you. I feel it a little hard that there should be strangers here this evening--like Mr. Lankester and Mr. Barrington. But it could not be helped. Mr. Lankester was speaking for Oliver last night--and Mr. Barrington invited himself. I really don't know why. Oliver is dreadfully tired--and so am I. The ingratitude and ill-feeling of many of our neighbors has tried me sorely. It will be a long time before I forget it. It really seems as though nothing were worth striving for in this very difficult world."

"Poor Lucy!" said Ferrier to himself, his heart softening, as usual. "Barrington? H'm. That's odd." He had only time for a short reply:

"My dear Lady Lucy,--It's horrid that you are tired and depressed. I wish I could come and cheer you up. Politics are a cursed trade. But never mind, Oliver is safely in, and as soon as the Government is formed, I will come to Tallyn, and we will laugh at these woes. I can't write at greater length now, for Broadstone has just summoned me. You will have seen that he went to Windsor this morning. Now the agony begins. Let's hope it may be decently short. I am just off for town.

"Yours ever, John Ferrier."

Two days passed--three days--and still the "agony" lasted. Lord Broadstone's house in Portman Square was besieged all day by anxious journalists watching the goings and comings of a Cabinet in the making. But nothing could be communicated to the newspapers--nothing, in fact, was settled. Envoys went backward and forward to Lord Philip in Northamptonshire. Urgent telegrams invited him to London. He took no notice of the telegrams; he did not invite the envoys, and when they came he had little or nothing of interest to say to them. Lord Broadstone, he declared, was fully in possession of his views. He had nothing more to add. And, indeed, a short note from him laid by in the new Premier's pocket-book was, if the truth were known, the _fons et origo_ of all Lord Broadstone's difficulties.

Meanwhile the more conservative section exerted itself, and by the evening of the third day it seemed to have triumphed. A rumor spread abroad that Lord Philip had gone too far. Ferrier emerged from a long colloquy with the Prime Minister, walking briskly across the square with his secretary, smiling at some of the reporters in waiting. Twenty minutes later, as he stood in the smoking-room of the Reform, surrounded by a few privileged friends, Lankester passed through the room.

"By Jove," he said to a friend with him, "I believe Ferrier's done the trick!"

* * * * *

In spite, however, of a contented mind, Ferrier was aware, on reaching his own house, that he was far from well. There was nothing very much to account for his feeling of illness. A slight pain across the chest, a slight feeling of faintness, when he came to count up his symptoms; nothing else appeared. It was a glorious summer evening. He determined to go back to Chide, who now always returned to Lytchett by an evening train, after a working-day in town. Accordingly, the new Chancellor of the Exchequer and Leader of the House dined lightly, and went off to St. Pancras, leaving a note for the Prime Minister to say where he was to be found, and promising to come to town again the following afternoon.

* * * * *

The following morning fulfilled the promise of the tranquil evening and starry night, which, amid the deep quiet of the country, had done much to refresh a man, in whom, indeed, a stimulating consciousness of success seemed already to have repaired the ravages of the fight.

Ferrier was always an early riser, and by nine o'clock he and Sir James were pottering and smoking in the garden. A long case in which Chide had been engaged had come to an end the preceding day. The great lawyer sent word to his chambers that he was not coming up to town; Ferrier ascertained that he was only half an hour from a telegraph office, made a special arrangement with the local post as to a mid-day delivery of letters, and then gave himself up for the morning to rest, gossip, and a walk.

By a tiresome _contretemps_ the newspapers did not arrive at breakfast-time. Sir James was but a new-comer in the district, and the parcel of papers due to him had gone astray through the stupidity of a newsboy. A servant was sent into Dunscombe, five miles off; and meanwhile Ferrier bore the blunder with equanimity. His letters of the morning, fresh from the heart of things, made newspapers a mere superfluity. They could tell him nothing that he did not know already. And as for opinions, those might wait.

He proposed, indeed, before the return of the servant from Dunscombe, to walk over to Beechcote. The road lay through woods, two miles of shade. He pined for exercise; Diana and her young sympathy acted as a magnet both on him and on Sir James; and it was to be presumed she took a daily paper, being, as Ferrier recalled, "a terrible little Tory."

In less than an hour they were at Beechcote. They found Diana and Mrs. Colwood on the lawn of the old house, reading and working in the shade of a yew hedge planted by that Topham Beauclerk who was a friend of Johnson. The scent of roses and limes; the hum of bees; the beauty of slow-sailing clouds, and of the shadows they flung on the mellowed color of the house; combined with the figure of Diana in white, her eager eyes, her smile, and her unquenchable interest in all that concerned the two friends, of whose devotion to her she was so gratefully and simply proud--these things put the last touch to Ferrier's enjoyment. He flung himself on the grass, talking to both the ladies of the incidents and absurdities of Cabinet-making, with a freedom and fun, an abandonment of anxiety and care that made him young again. Nobody mentioned a newspaper.

Presently Chide, who had now taken the part of general adviser to Diana, which had once been filled by Marsham, strolled off with her to look at a greenhouse in need of repairs. Mrs. Colwood was called in by some household matter. Ferrier was left alone.

As usual, he had a book in his pocket. This time it was a volume of selected essays, ranging from Bacon to Carlyle. He began lazily to turn the pages, smiling to himself the while at the paradoxes of life. Here, for an hour, he sat under the limes, drunk with summer breezes and scents, toying with a book, as though he were some "indolent irresponsible reviewer"--some college fellow in vacation--some wooer of an idle muse. Yet dusk that evening would find him once more in the Babel of London. And before him lay the most strenuous, and, as he hoped, the most fruitful passage of his political life. Broadstone, too, was an old man; the Premiership itself could not be far away.

As for Lord Philip--Ferrier's thoughts ran upon that gentleman with a good-humor which was not without malice. He had played his cards extremely well, but the trumps in his hand had not been quite strong enough. Well, he was young; plenty of time yet for Cabinet office. That he would be a thorn in the side of the new Ministry went without saying. Ferrier felt no particular dismay at the prospect, and amused himself with speculations on the letters which had probably passed that very day between Broadstone and the "iratus Achilles" in Northamptonshire.

And from Lord Philip, Ferrier's thoughts--shrewdly indulgent--strayed to the other conspirators, and to Oliver Marsham in particular, their spokesman and intermediary. Suddenly a great softness invaded him toward Oliver and his mother. After all, had he not been hard with the boy, to leave him to his fight without a word of help? Oliver's ways were irritating; he had more than one of the intriguer's gifts; and several times during the preceding weeks Ferrier's mind had recurred with disquiet to the letters in his hands. But, after all, things had worked out better than could possibly have been expected. The _Herald_, in particular, had done splendid service, to himself personally, and to the moderates in general. Now was the time for amnesty and reconciliation all round. Ferrier's mind ran busily on schemes of the kind. As to Oliver, he had already spoken to Broadstone about him, and would speak again that night. Certainly he must have something--Junior Lordship at least. And if he were opposed on re-election, why, he should be helped--roundly helped. Ferrier already saw himself at Tallyn once more, with Lady Lucy's frail hand in one of his, the other perhaps on Oliver's shoulder. After all, where was he happy--or nearly happy--but with them?

* * * * *

His eyes returned to his book. With a mild amusement he saw that it had opened of itself at an essay, by Abraham Cowley, on "Greatness" and its penalties: "Out of these inconveniences arises naturally one more, which is, that no greatness can be satisfied or contented