A People's Man Part 43

"Very!"

Mr. Foley gripped his arm.

"My friend," he said,--"you see, I am beginning to call you that--you have talked to-night with one of the most wonderful and the most dangerous enemies of our country. You won't think me drivelling, will you, or presuming, if I beg you to remember that fact, and that you are, notwithstanding your foreign birth, one of us? You are an Englishman, a member of the English House of Parliament."

"I do not forget that," Maraton declared gravely.

"Go and find Lady Elisabeth," Mr. Foley directed. "She was a little hurt at the idea that you were not coming. I have a few more words to say to Armley."

Maraton pa.s.sed on into the rooms, which were only half filled. Some fancy possessed him to pause for a moment in the spot where he had stood alone for some time on his first visit to this house, and as he lingered there, Lady Elisabeth came into the room, leaning on the arm of a great lawyer. She saw him almost at once--her eyes, indeed, seemed to glance instinctively towards the spot where he was standing. Maraton felt the change in her expression. With a whisper she left her escort and came immediately in his direction. He watched her, step by step. Was it his fancy or had she lost some of the haughtiness of carriage which he had noticed that night not many months ago; the slight coldness which in those first moments had half attracted and half repelled him? Perhaps it was because he was now admitted within the circle of her friends.

She came to him, at any rate, quickly, almost eagerly, and the smile about her lips as she took his hand was one of real and natural pleasure.

"How good of you!" she murmured. "I scarcely hoped that you would come.

You have been with Maxendorf?"

He nodded.

"Is it a confession?" he asked. "It was Mr. Foley's first question to me."

"It is because we hate and distrust the man," she replied. "You aren't a politician, you see, Mr. Maraton. You don't quite appreciate some of the forces which are making an old man of my uncle to-day, which make life almost intolerable for many of us when we think seriously," she went on simply.

"Aren't you exaggerating that sentiment just a little?" he suggested.

"Not a particle," she a.s.sured him. "However, you came here to be entertained, didn't you? I won't croak to you any more. I think I have done my duty for this evening. Let us find a corner and talk like ordinary human beings. Are you going in to supper?"

"I hadn't thought of it," he admitted.

"I dined at seven o'clock," she told him. "We seem to have provided supper for hundreds of people, and I am sure not half of them are coming."

They pa.s.sed through two of the rooms into a long, low apartment which led into the winter gardens. At one end refreshments were being served, and the rest of the s.p.a.ce was taken up with little tables. Elisabeth led him to one placed just inside the winter garden. A footman filled their gla.s.ses with champagne.

"Now we are going to be normal human beings," she declared. "How much I wish that you really were a normal human being!"

"In what respect am I different?"

"You know quite well," she answered. "I should like you to be what you seem to be--just a capable, clever, rising politician, with a place in the Cabinet before you, working for your country, sincere, free from all these strange notions."

"Working for my country," he repeated. "That is just the difficult part of the whole situation, nowadays. I know that I am rather a trouble to your uncle. Sometimes I fear that I may become even a greater trouble.

It is so hard to adopt the att.i.tude which you suggest when one feels the intolerable situation which exists in that country."

"But we are on the highroad now to great reforms," she reminded him.

"Another decade of years, and the people whom you wors.h.i.+p will surely be lifting their heads."

He smiled as she looked across at him with a puzzled air.

"It is strange," she remarked, "that you, too, have the appearance of a man dissatisfied with himself. I wonder why? Surely you must feel that everything has gone your way since you came to England?"

"I am not sure how I feel about it," he replied. "Think! I came with different ideas. I came with a religion which admitted no compromises, and I have accepted a compromise."

"A wise and a sane one," she declared, almost pa.s.sionately. "And to-night--tell me, am I not right?--to-night there have been those who have sought to upset it in your mind."

"You are clairvoyant."

"Not I, but it is so easy to see! It is the dream of Maxendorf's life to bring England to the verge of a revolution by paralysing her industries. Better for him, that, than any violent scheme of conquest.

If he can stop the engine that drives the wheels of the country, they can come over in tourist steamers and tell us how to govern it better."

"And if they did," he asked quickly, "isn't it possible that their rule over the people might be better than the rule of this stubborn generation?"

She drew herself up. Her eyes flashed with anger.

"Haven't you a single gleam of patriotism?" she demanded.

He sighed.

"I think that I have," he replied, "and yet, it lies at the back of my thoughts, at the back of my heart. It is more like an artistic inspiration, one of those things that lie among the pleasant impulses of life. Right in the foreground I see the great groaning cycle of humanity being flung from the everlasting wheels into the bottomless abyss. I cannot take my eyes from the people, you see."

She sat almost rigid for some brief s.p.a.ce of time. A servant was arranging plates in front of them, their gla.s.ses were refilled, the music of a waltz stole in through the open door. Around them many other people were sitting. An atmosphere of gaiety began gradually to develop. Maraton watched his companion closely. Her eyes were full of trouble, her sensitive mouth quivering a little. There was a straight line across her forehead. Her fair hair was arranged in great coils, without a single ornament. She wore no jewels at all save a single string of pearls around her slim white neck. Maraton, as the moments pa.s.sed, was conscious of a curious weakening, a return of that same thrill which the sound of her voice that first day--half imperious, half gracious--had incited in him. He waved his hand towards the crowd of those who supped around them.

"Let us forget," he begged. "I, too, feel that I have more in my mind to-night than my brain can cope with. Let us rest for a little time."

Her face lightened.

"We will," she a.s.sented gladly. "Only, do remember what my constant prayer about you is. Things, you know, in some respects must go on as they are, and the country needs its strongest sons. Mr. Foley would like to bring you even closer to him. I know he is simply aching with impatience to have you in the Cabinet. Don't do anything rash, Mr.

Maraton. Don't do anything which would make it impossible. There are many beautiful theories in life which would be simply hateful failures if one tried to bring them into practice. Try to remember that experience goes for something. And now--finished! Tell me about Sheffield? I read Selingman's marvellous article. One could almost see the whole scene there. How I should love to hear you speak! Not in Parliament--I don't mean that. I almost realise how impossible you find that."

"It is only a matter of earnestness," he replied, "and a certain apt.i.tude for forming phrases quickly. No one can feel deeply about anything and not find themselves more or less eloquent when they come to talk about it. By the bye, have you ever met Selingman?"

She shook her head.

"My uncle knew him. He tells me that he asked him here to-night. I wish that he had come. And yet, I am not sure. Some of his writings I have hated. He, too, is a theorist, isn't he? I wonder--"

She paused, and looked expectant.

"I often wonder," she went on, "is there nothing else in your life at all except this pa.s.sionate altruism? In your younger life, for instance, weren't there ever any sports or occupations that you cared for?"

"Yes," he admitted slowly, "for some years I did a good many of the usual things."

"And now the desire for them has all gone," she asked, "haven't you any personal hopes or dreams in connection with life? Isn't there anything you look forward to or desire for yourself?"

"I seem to have so little time. And yet, one has dreams--one always must have dreams, you know."

"Tell me about yours?" she insisted.

He sat up abruptly. Her fingers fell upon his arm.

"We will go and sit under my rose tree," she suggested.

They moved back into the winter garden until they came to a seat at its furthest extremity. A fountain was playing a few yards away, and cl.u.s.ters of great pink roses were drooping down from some trellis-work before them.