THE END OF THE SESSION.
The Duke of St Bungay had been very much disappointed.He had contradicted with a repetition of noes the assertion of the Duchess that he had been the Warwick who had placed the Prime Minister's crown on the head of the Duke of Omnium, but no doubt he felt in his heart that he had done so much towards it that his advice respecting the vacant Garter, when given so much weight, should have been followed.He was an old man, and had known the secrets of Cabinet Councils when his younger friend was a little boy.He had given advice to Lord John, and had been one of the first to congratulate Sir Robert Peel when that statesman became a free-trader.He had sat in conclave with THE Duke, and had listened to the bold Liberalism of old Earl Grey, both in the Lower and the Upper House.He had been always great in council, never giving his advice unasked, nor throwing his pearls before swine, and cautious at all times to avoid excesses on this side or that.He had never allowed himself a hobby horse of his own to ride, had never been ambitious, had never sought to be the ostensible leader of men.But he did now think that when, with all his experience, he spoke very much in earnest, some attention should be paid to what he said.When he had described a certain line of conduct as Quixotic he had been very much in earnest.He did not usually indulge in strong language, and Quixotic, when applied to the conduct of the Prime Minister, was, to his ideas, very strong.The thing described as Quixotic had now been done, and the Duke of St Bungay was a disappointed man.
For an hour or two he thought that he must gently secede from all private counsels with the Prime Minister.To resign, or to put impediments in the way of his own chief, did not belong to his character.That line of strategy had come into fashion since he had learnt his political rudiments, and was very odious to him.
But in all party compacts there must be inner parties, peculiar bonds, and confidence stricter, stronger and also sweeter than those which bind together the twenty or thirty gentlemen who form a Government.From those closer ties which had hitherto bound him to the Duke of Omnium he thought, for a while, that he must divorce himself.Surely on such a subject as the nomination of a Knight of the Garter his advice might have been taken,--if only because it had come from him! And so he kept himself apart for a day or two, and even in the House of Lords ceased to whisper kindly, cheerful words into the ears of his next neighbour.
But various remembrances crowded in upon him by degrees, compelling him to moderate and at last to abandon his purpose.
Among these the first was the memory of the kiss he had given to the Duchess.The woman had told him that she loved him, that he was one of the very few whom she did love,--and the word had gone straight into his old heart.She had bade him not to desert her; and he had not only given her his promise, but he had converted that promise into a sacred pledge by a kiss.He had known well why she had exacted the promise.The turmoil in her husband's mind, the agony which he sometimes endured when people spoke ill of him, the aversion which he had at first genuinely felt to an office for which he hardly thought himself fit, and now the gradual love of power created by the exercise of power, had all been seen by her, and had created that solicitude which had induced her to ask for the promise.The old Duke had known them both well, but had hardly as yet given the Duchess credit for so true devotion to her husband.It now seemed to him that, though she had failed to love the man, she had given her entire heart to the Prime Minister.He sympathized with her altogether, and, at any rate, could not go back from his promise.
And then he remembered, too, that if this man did anything amiss in the high office which he had been made to fill, who had induced him to fill it was responsible.What right had he, the Duke of St Bungay, to be angry because his friend was not all-wise at all points? Let the Droughts and the Drummonds and the Beeswaxes quarrel among themselves or with their colleagues.He belonged to a different school, in the teachings of which there was less perhaps of excitement and more of long-suffering;--but surely, also, more of nobility.He was, at any rate, too old to change, and he would therefore be true to his friend through evil and through good.Having thought all this out he again whispered some cheery word to the Prime Minister, as they sat listening to the denunciations of Lord Fawn, a Liberal lord, much used to business, but who had not been received into the Coalition.The first whisper and the second whisper the Prime Minister received very coldly.He had fully appreciated the discontinuance of whispers, and was aware of the cause.He had made a selection on his own unassisted judgment in opposition to his old friend's advice, and this was the result.Let it be so! All his friends were turning away from him and he would have to stand alone.If so, he would stand alone till the pendulum of the House of Commons had told him that it was time for him to retire.But gradually the determined good-humour of the old man prevailed.
'He has a wonderful gift of saying nothing with second-rate dignity,' whispered the repentant friend, speaking of Lord Fawn.
'A very honest man,' said the Prime Minister in return.
'A sort of bastard honesty,--by precept out of stupidity.There is no real conviction in it, begotten by thought.' This little bit of criticism, harsh as it was, had the effect, and the Prime Minister became less miserable than he had been.
But Lord Drummond forgave nothing.He still held his office, but more than once he was seen in private conference with both Sir Orlando and Mr Boffin.He did not attempt to conceal his anger.