'WHAT BUSINESS IS IT OF YOURS?'
Things had not gone altogether smoothly with the Duchess herself since the breaking up of the party at Gatherum Castle,--nor perhaps quite smoothly with the Duke.It was now March.The House was again sitting, and they were both in London,--but till they came to town they had remained at the Castle, and that huge mansion had not been found to be more comfortable by either of them as it became empty.For a time the Duchess had been cowed by her husband's stern decision; but as he again became gentle to her,--almost seeming by his manner to apologize for his unwonted roughness,--she plucked up her spirit and declared herself that she would not give up the battle.All that she did,--was it not for his sake? And why should she not have her ambition in life as well as he have his? And had she not succeeded in all that she had done? Could it be right that she should be asked to abandon everything, to own herself to have been defeated, to be shown to have failed before all the world, because such a one as Major Pountney had made a fool of himself? She attributed it all to Major Pountney;--very wrongly.When a man's mind is veering towards some decision, some conclusion which he has been perhaps slow in reaching, it is probably a little thing which at last fixes his mind and clenches his thoughts.The Duke had been gradually teaching himself to hate the crowd around him and to reprobate his wife's strategy, before he had known that there was a Major Pountney under his roof.Others had offended him, and first and foremost among them his own colleague, Sir Orlando.
The Duchess hardly read his character aright, and certainly did not understand his present motives, when she thought that all might be forgotten as soon as the disagreeable savour of the Major should have passed away.
But in nothing, as she thought, had her husband been so silly as in his abandonment of Silverbridge.When she heard that the day was fixed for declaring the vacancy, she ventured to ask him a question.His manner to her lately had been more than urbane, more than affectionate,--it had almost been that of a lover.He had petted her and caressed her when they met, and once even said that nothing should really trouble him as long as he had her with him.Such a speech as that never in his life had he made before to her! So she plucked up her courage and asked her question,--not exactly on that occasion, but soon afterwards.'May I not say a word to Sprugeon about the election?'
'Not a word!' And he looked at her as he had looked on that day when he had told her of the Major's sins.She tossed her head and pouted her lips and walked on without speaking.If it was to be so, then indeed would she have failed.And, therefore, though in his general manner he was loving to her, things were not going smooth with her.
And things were not going smooth with him because there had reached him a most troublous dispatch from Sir Orlando Drought only two days before the Cabinet meeting at which the points to be made in the Queen's speech were to be decided.It had been already agreed that a proposition should be made to Parliament by the Government, for an extension of the country suffrage, with some slight redistribution of seats.The towns with less than 20,000 inhabitants were to take in some increased portion of the country parishes around.But there was not enough of a policy in this to satisfy Sir Orlando, nor was the conduct of the bill through the House to be placed in his hands.That was to be entrusted to Mr Monk, and Mr Monk would be, if not nominally the leader, yet the chief man of the Government of the House of Commons.This was displeasing to Sir Orlando, and he had, therefore, demanded from the Prime Minister more of a 'policy'.
Sir Orlando's present idea of a policy was the building of four bigger ships of war than had ever been built before,--with larger guns, and more men, and thicker iron plates, and, above all, with a greater expenditure of money.He had even gone so far as to say, though not in his semi-official letter to the Prime Minister, that he thought that 'The Salvation of the Empire' should be the cry of the Coalition party.'After all,'
he said, 'what the people care about is the Salvation of the Empire!' Sir Orlando was at the head of the Admiralty; and if glory was to be achieved by the four ships, it would rest first on the head of Sir Orlando.
Now the Duke thought that the Empire was safe, and had been throughout his political life averse to increasing the army and the navy estimates.He regarded the four ships as altogether unnecessary,--and when reminded that he might in this way consolidate the Coalition, said that he would rather do without the Coalition and the four ships than have to do with both of them together,--an opinion which was thought by some to be almost traitorous to the party as now organized.The secrets of Cabinets are not to be disclosed lightly, but it came to be understood,--as what is done at Cabinet meetings generally does come to be understood,--that there was something like disagreement.The Prime Minister, the Duke of St Bungay, and Mr Monk were altogether against the four ships.Sir Orlando, who was supported by Lord Drummond and another of his old friends.
