Part 85 (1/2)

But what right had Wharton to be thinking of such irrelevant matters as women and love-making at all? He had spoken of public worries to Lady Selina. In reality his public prospects in themselves were, if anything, improved. It was his private affairs that were rus.h.i.+ng fast on catastrophe, and threatening to drag the rest with them.

He had never been so hard pressed for money in his life. In the first place his gambling debts had mounted up prodigiously of late. His friends were tolerant and easy-going. But the more tolerant they were the more he was bound to frequent them. And his luck for some time had been monotonously bad. Before long these debts must be paid, and some of them--to a figure he shrank from dwelling upon--were already urgent.

Then as to the _Clarion_, it became every week a heavier burden. The expenses of it were enormous; the returns totally inadequate.

Advertis.e.m.e.nts were falling off steadily; and whether the working cost were cut down, or whether a new and good man like Louis Craven, whose letters from the strike district were being now universally read, were put on, the result financially seemed to be precisely the same. It was becoming even a desperate question how the weekly expenses were to be met; so that Wharton's usual good temper now deserted him entirely as soon as he had crossed the _Clarion_ threshold; bitterness had become the portion of the staff, and even the office boys walked in gloom.

Yet, at the same time, withdrawing from the business, was almost as difficult as carrying it on. There were rumours in the air which had, already seriously damaged the paper as a saleable concern. Wharton, indeed, saw no prospect whatever of selling except at ruinous loss.

Meanwhile, to bring the paper to an abrupt end would have not only precipitated a number of his financial obligations; it would have been politically, a dangerous confession of failure made at a very critical moment. For what made the whole thing the more annoying was that the _Clarion_ had never been so important politically, never so much read by the persons on whom Wharton's parliamentary future depended, as it was at this moment. The advocacy of the Damesley strike had been so far a stroke of business for Wharton as a Labour Member.

It was now the seventh week of the strike, and Wharton's ”leaders,”

Craven's letters from the seat of war, and the _Clarion_ strike fund, which articles and letters had called into existence, were as vigorous as ever. The struggle itself had fallen into two chapters. In the first the metal-workers concerned, both men and women, had stood out for the old wages unconditionally and had stoutly rejected all idea of arbitration. At the end of three or four weeks, however, when grave suffering had declared itself among an already half-starved population, the workers had consented to take part in the appointment of a board of conciliation. This board, including the workmen's delegates, overawed by the facts of foreign compet.i.tion as they were disclosed by the masters, recommended terms which would have amounted to a victory for the employers.

The award was no sooner known in the district than the pa.s.sionate indignation of the great majority of the workers knew no bounds.

Meetings were held everywhere; the men's delegates at the board were thrown over, and Craven, who with his new wife was travelling incessantly over the whole strike area, wrote a letter to the _Clarion_ on the award which stated the men's case with extreme ability, was immediately backed up by Wharton in a tremendous ”leader,” and was received among the strikers with tears almost of grat.i.tude and enthusiasm.

Since then all negotiations had been broken off. The _Clarion_ had gone steadily against the masters, against the award, against further arbitration. The theory of the ”living wage,” of which more recent days have heard so much, was preached in other terms, but with equal vigour; and the columns of the _Clarion_ bore witness day by day in the long lists of subscriptions to the strike fund, to the effects of its eloquence on the hearts and pockets of Englishmen.

Meanwhile there were strange rumours abroad. It was said that the trade was really on the eve of a complete and striking revolution in its whole conditions--could this labour war be only cleared out of the way. The smaller employers had been for long on the verge of ruin; and the larger men, so report had it, were scheming a syndicate on the American plan to embrace the whole industry, cut down the costs of production, and regulate the output.

But for this large capital would be wanted. Could capital be got? The state of things in the trade, according to the employers, had been deplorable for years; a large part of the market had been definitely forfeited, so they declared, for good, to Germany and Belgium. It would take years before even a powerful syndicate could work itself into a thoroughly sound condition. Let the men accept the award of the conciliation board; let there be some stable and reasonable prospect of peace between masters and men, say, for a couple of years; and a certain group of bankers would come forward; and all would be well. The men under the syndicate would in time get more than their old wage. _But the award first_; otherwise the plan dropped, and the industry must go its own way to perdition.

”'Will you walk into my parlour?'” said Wharton, scornfully, to the young Conservative member who, with a purpose, was explaining these things to him in the library of the House of Commons, ”the merest trap!

and, of course, the men will see it so. Who is to guarantee them even the carrying through, much less the success, of your precious syndicate?

And, in return for your misty millennium two years hence, the men are to join at once in putting the employers in a stronger position than ever?

Thank you! The 'rent of ability' in the present state of things is, no doubt, large. But in this particular case the _Clarion_ will go on doing its best--I promise you--to nibble some of it away!”

The Conservative member rose in indignation.

”I should be sorry to have as many starving people on my conscience as you'll have before long!” he said as he took up his papers.

At that moment Denny's rotund and square-headed figure pa.s.sed along the corridor, to which the library door stood open.

”Well, if I thrive upon it as well as Denny does, I shall do!” returned Wharton, with his usual caustic good-humour, as his companion departed.

And it delighted him to think as he walked home that Denny, who had again of late made himself particularly obnoxious in the House of Commons, on two or three occasions, to the owner of the _Clarion_, had probably instigated the quasi-overtures he had just rejected, and must be by now aware of their result.

Then he sent for Craven to come and confer with him.

Craven accordingly came up from the Midlands, pale, thin, and exhausted, with the exertions and emotions of seven weeks' incessant labour. Yet personally Wharton found him, as before, dry and unsympathetic; and disliked him, and his cool, ambiguous manner, more than ever. As to the strike, however, they came to a complete understanding. The _Clarion_, or rather the _Clarion_ fund, which was doing better and better, held the key of the whole situation. If that fund could be maintained, the men could hold out. In view of the possible formation of the syndicate, Craven denounced the award with more fierceness than ever, maintaining the redoubled importance of securing the men's terms before the syndicate was launched. Wharton promised him with glee that he should be supported to the bitter end.

_If_, that is to say--a proviso he did not discuss with Craven--the _Clarion_ itself could be kept going. In August a large sum, obtained two years before on the security of new ”plant,” would fall due. The time for repayment had already been extended; and Wharton had ascertained that no further extension was possible.

Well! bankruptcy would be a piquant interlude in his various social and political enterprises! How was it to be avoided? He had by now plenty of rich friends in the City or elsewhere, but none, as he finally decided, likely to be useful to him at the present moment. For the amount of money that he required was large--larger, indeed, than he cared to verify with any strictness, and the security that he could offer, almost nil.

As to friends in the City, indeed, the only excursion of a business kind that he had made into those regions since his election was now adding seriously to his anxieties--might very well turn out, unless the matter were skilfully managed, to be one of the blackest spots on his horizon.