Our Friend the Charlatan Part 33

CHAPTER XVI

For a week after Lady Ogram's return, Dr. Baldwin called daily at Rivenoak. His patient, he said, was suffering from over-exertion; had she listened to his advice, she would never have gone to London; the marvel was that such an imprudence had had no worse results. Lady Ogram herself of course refused to take this view of the matter; she was perfectly well, only a little tired, and, as the hot nights interfered with her sleep just now, she rested during the greater part of the day, seeing Lashmar for half an hour each afternoon in the little drawing-room upstairs. Her friendliness with Dyce had much increased; when he entered the room, she greeted him almost affectionately, and their talk was always of his brilliant future.

"I want to see you safely in Parliament," she said one day. "I can't expect to live till you've made your name; that isn't done so quickly.

But I shall see you squash Robb, and that's something."

Of his success at Hollingford she seemed never to entertain a doubt, and Lashmar, though by no means so sanguine, said nothing to discourage her. His eye noted ominous changes in her aspect, and her way of talking, even the sound of her voice, made plain to him that she was very rapidly losing the reserve of force which kept her alive.

Constance, who was on friendly terms with the doctor, learnt enough of the true state of things to make her significantly grave after each visit; she and Dyce, naturally, exchanged no remark on the subject.

"What do your parents say?" Lady Ogram asked of Lashmar, during one of their conversations.

"They are delighted. Especially my mother, who has always been very ambitious for me."

"But I mean about your engagement."

Dyce had of course omitted all mention of Constance in his letters to Alverholme.

"They give their approval," he replied, "because they have confidence in my judgment. I fancy," he added with a modest smile, "that their ambition, in this respect, is not altogether satisfied, but--I have said nothing whatever to them about the peculiarity of Constance's position; I didn't feel justified in doing so."

"You may tell them everything," said Lady Ogram, graciously.

She one day received a letter from Mrs. Toplady, which gave her great satisfaction. It seemed to re-establish her vigour of mind and body; she came downstairs, lunched with her young friends, and talked of going to Wales.

"May is enjoying herself greatly; she must stay a little longer. The day before yesterday she was at a garden party at Lady Honeybourne's, where they acted 'As You Like It' in the open air."

"There was mention of it yesterday in the papers," remarked Lashmar.

"Yes, yes; I saw. And May's name among the guests--of course, of course. I notice that Lord Dymchurch was there too."

She ended with a quavering laugh, unexpected and rather uncanny.

"And the much-discussed Mr. Langtoft," put in Constance, after a keen look at the mirthful hippocratic face.

"Langtoft, yes," said Dyce. "I don't quite know what to think of that fellow. There seems to me something not quite genuine about him. What is he doing at Lady Honeybourne's garden party? It looks like tuft-hunting--don't you think, Constance?"

Dyce was secretly annoyed that an idea of his own (that is to say, from his own French philosopher) should be put into practice by someone else before he could a.s.sert his claim to it. Very vexatious that Langtoft's activity was dragged into public notice just at this moment.

"I don't at all like the tone of his last letter to you," said Constance. "He writes in a very flippant way, not a bit like a man in earnest."

Not long ago, Miss Bride's opinion of Langtoft would have been quite different. Now, she was disposed to say things that Dyce Lashmar liked to hear. Dyce had remarked the change in her; it flattered him, but caused him at the same time some uneasiness.

Inevitably, they pa.s.sed much time together. On the journey from London, Constance had asked him whether he would not like to begin cycling. He received the suggestion with careless good-humour. At Rivenoak, Constance returned to it, insisted upon it, and, as he had little to do, Dyce went into Hollingford for lessons; in a week's time he could ride, and, on a brand-new bicycle of the most approved make, accompanied his nominally betrothed about the country ways. Constance evidently enjoyed their rides together. She was much more amiable in her demeanour, more cheerful in mind; she dropped the habit of irony, and talked hopefully of Lashmar's prospects.

"What's the news from Breakspeare?" she inquired, as they were pedalling softly along an easy road one afternoon, Dyce having spent the morning in Hollingford.

"Oh, he's a prancing optimist," Dyce replied. "He sees everything rose-colour--or pretends to, I'm not quite sure which. If Dobbin the grocer meets him in the street, and says he's going to vote Liberal at next election, Breakspeare sings the Paean."

"I notice that you seem rather doubtful, lately," said Constance, her eyes upon him.

"Well, you know, there is a good deal of doubt. It depends so much on what happens between now and the dissolution."

He entered into political detail, showing the forces arrayed against him, dwelling on the in-grained Toryism of Hollingford, or, as he called it, the burgesses' _Robbish_ mind.

"There's no use, is there, in blinking facts?"

"Of course not. It's what I never do, as I think you are aware. We must remember that to contest the seat is something. It makes you known. If you don't win, you will wait for the next chance--not necessarily here."

Dyce had observed that the p.r.o.noun "we" was rather frequently on Constance's lips. She was identifying their interests.

"True," he admitted. "Look at that magnificent sycamore!"

"Yes; but I shouldn't have known it was a sycamore. How is it you know trees so well?"

"That's my father's doing," replied Dyce. "He used to teach me them when I was a youngster."

"Mine was thinking more about social statistics. I knew the number of paupers in London before I had learnt to distinguish between an ash and an oak. Do you ever hear from your father?"

"Now and then," said Lashmar, his machine wobbling a little, for he had not yet perfect command of it, and fell into some peril if his thoughts strayed. "They want me to run over to Alverholme presently. Perhaps I may go next week."

Constance was silent. They wheeled on, without speaking, for some minutes. Then Dyce asked:

"How long does Lady Ogram wish me to stay here?"

"I don't quite know. Are you in any hurry to get away?"

"Not at all. Only, if I'm soon going back to London, I should take Alverholme on the journey. Would you probe our friend for me?"

"I'll try."

At this time, they were both reading a book of Nietzsche. That philosopher had only just fallen into their hands, though of course they had heard much of him. Lashmar found the matter considerably to his taste, though he ridiculed the form. Nietzsche's individualism was, up to a certain point, in full harmony with the tone of his mind; he enjoyed this frank contempt of the average man, persuaded that his own place was on the seat of the lofty, and that disdain of the humdrum, in life or in speculation, had always been his strong point. To be sure, he counted himself Nietzsche's superior as a moralist; as a thinker, he imagined himself much more scientific. But, having regard to his circ.u.mstances and his hopes, this glorification of unscrupulous strength came opportunely. Refining away its grosser aspects, Dyce took the philosophy to heart--much more sincerely than he had taken to himself the humanitarian bio-sociology on which he sought to build his reputation.

And Constance, for her part, was hardly less interested in Nietzsche.

She, too, secretly liked this insistence on the right of the strong, for she felt herself one of them. She, too, for all her occupation with social reform, was at core a thorough individualist, desiring far less the general good than her own attainment of celebrity as a public benefactress. Nietzsche spoke to her instincts, as he does to those of a mult.i.tude of men and women, hungry for fame, avid of popular applause. But she, like Lashmar, criticised her philosopher from a moral height. She did not own to herself the intimacy of his appeal to her.

"He'll do a great deal of harm in the world," she said, this same afternoon, as Dyce and she drank tea together. "The jingo impulse, and all sorts of forces making for animalism, will get strength from him, directly or indirectly. It's the negation of all we are working for, you and I."

"Of course it is," Dyce replied, in a voice of conviction. "We have to fight against him." He added, after a pause, "There is a truth in him, of course; but it's one of those truths which are dangerous to the generality of men."

Constance a.s.sented, with a certain vagueness.

"Of course. And he delivers his message so brutally."

"That, no doubt, increases its chance of acceptance. The weak, who don't know how else to a.s.sert, themselves, tend naturally to brutality.

Carlyle taught pretty much the same thing, at bottom; but his humour and his puritanism made the effect different. Besides, the time wasn't ripe then for the doctrine of irresponsible force; religion hadn't utterly perished in the ma.s.ses of men, as it has now. Given a world without religious faith, in full social revolution, with possibilities of wealth and power dangled before every man's eyes--what can you expect but the prevalences of a more or less ferocious egoism? We, who are _not_ egoists"--he looked into his companion's eyes--"yet are conscious of unusual strength, may, it seems to me, avail ourselves of the truth in Nietzsche, which, after all, is very much the same as my own theory of the selection of the fit for rule. The difference is, that we wish to use our power for the common good, whilst Nietzsche's teaching results in a return to sheer barbarism, the weak trampled because of their weakness."

Constance approved. Yes, their aim, undoubtedly, was the common good, and, whilst keeping this in view, they need not, perhaps, be over-fastidious as to the means they employed. She had for years regarded herself as at war with society, in the narrow sense of the word; its creeds, great or small, had no validity for her; she had striven for what she deemed her rights, the rights of a woman born with intellect and will and imagination, yet condemned by poverty to rank among subordinates. The struggle appeared to have brought her within view of triumph, and was it not to herself, her natural powers and qualities, that she owed all? At this moment she felt her right to pursue any object which seemed to her desirable. What was good for _her_, was good for the world at large.

The next morning they started at the usual hour for their ride, but the sky was cloudy, and, as they were leaving the park, spots of rain fell.