Part 17 (1/2)

He was reading a letter. ”You were dining there on Friday night, weren't you?” he asked her, without looking up.

Joan flushed. What did he mean by cross-examining her in this way? She was not at all used to impertinence from the opposite s.e.x.

”Your information is quite correct,” she answered.

Her anger betrayed itself in her tone; and he shot a swift glance at her.

”I didn't mean to offend you,” he said. ”A mutual friend, a Mr. Airlie, happened to be of the party, and he mentioned you.”

He threw aside the letter. ”I'll tell you what I want you to do,” he said. ”It's nothing to object to. Tell him that you've seen me and had a talk. I understand his scheme to be that the country should grow more and more food until it eventually becomes self-supporting; and that the Government should control the distribution. Tell him that with that I'm heart and soul in sympathy; and would like to help him.” He pushed aside a pile of papers and, leaning across the desk, spoke with studied deliberation. ”If he can see his way to making his policy dependent upon Protection, we can work together.”

”And if he can't?” suggested Joan.

He fixed his large, colourless eyes upon her. ”That's where you can help him,” he answered. ”If he and I combine forces, we can pull this through in spite of the furious opposition that it is going to arouse. Without a good Press he is helpless; and where is he going to get his Press backing if he turns me down? From half a dozen Socialist papers whose support will do him more harm than good. If he will bring the working cla.s.s over to Protection I will undertake that the Tariff Reformers and the Agricultural Interest shall accept his Socialism. It will be a victory for both of us.

”If he gain his end, what do the means matter?” he continued, as Joan did not answer. ”Food may be dearer; the Unions can square that by putting up wages; while the poor devil of a farm labourer will at last get fair treatment. We can easily insist upon that. What do you think, yourself?”

”About Protection,” she answered. ”It's one of the few subjects I haven't made up my mind about.”

He laughed. ”You will find all your pet reforms depend upon it, when you come to work them out,” he said. ”You can't have a minimum wage without a minimum price.”

They had risen.

”I'll give him your message,” said Joan. ”But I don't see him exchanging his principles even for your support. I admit it's important.”

”Talk it over with him,” he said. ”And bear this in mind for your own guidance.” He took a step forward, which brought his face quite close to hers: ”If he fails, and all his life's work goes for nothing, I shall be sorry; but I shan't break my heart. He will.”

Joan dropped a note into Phillips's letter-box on her return home, saying briefly that she wished to see him; and he sent up answer asking her if she would come to the gallery that evening, and meet him after his speech, which would be immediately following the dinner hour.

It was the first time he had risen since his appointment, and he was received with general cheers. He stood out curiously youthful against the background of grey-haired and bald-headed men behind him; and there was youth also in his clear, ringing voice that not even the vault-like atmosphere of that shadowless chamber could altogether rob of its vitality. He spoke simply and good-humouredly, without any attempt at rhetoric, relying chiefly upon a crescendo of telling facts that gradually, as he proceeded, roused the House to that tense stillness that comes to it when it begins to think.

”A distinctly dangerous man,” Joan overheard a little old lady behind her comment to a friend. ”If I didn't hate him, I should like him.”

He met her in the corridor, and they walked up and down and talked, too absorbed to be aware of the curious eyes that were turned upon them. Joan gave him Carleton's message.

”It was clever of him to make use of you,” he said. ”If he'd sent it through anybody else, I'd have published it.”

”You don't think it even worth considering?” suggested Joan.

”Protection?” he flashed out scornfully. ”Yes, I've heard of that. I've listened, as a boy, while the old men told of it to one another, in thin, piping voices, round the fireside; how the labourers were flung eight-and- sixpence a week to die on, and the men starved in the towns; while the farmers kept their hunters, and got drunk each night on fine old crusted port. Do you know what their toast was in the big hotels on market day, with the windows open to the street: 'To a long war and a b.l.o.o.d.y one.' It would be their toast to-morrow, if they had their way. Does he think I am going to be a party to the putting of the people's neck again under their pitiless yoke?”

”But the people are more powerful now,” argued Joan. ”If the farmer demanded higher prices, they could demand higher wages.”

”They would never overtake the farmer,” he answered, with a laugh. ”And the last word would always be with him. I am out to get rid of the landlords,” he continued, ”not to establish them as the permanent rulers of the country, as they are in Germany. The people are more powerful--just a little, because they are no longer dependent on the land. They can say to the farmer, 'All right, my son, if that's your figure, I'm going to the shop next door--to South America, to Canada, to Russia.' It isn't a satisfactory solution. I want to see England happy and healthy before I bother about the Argentine. It drives our men into the slums when they might be living fine lives in G.o.d's fresh air. In the case of war it might be disastrous. There, I agree with him. We must be able to shut our door without fear of having to open it ourselves to ask for bread. How would Protection accomplish that? Did he tell you?”

”Don't eat me,” laughed Joan. ”I haven't been sent to you as a missionary. I'm only a humble messenger. I suppose the argument is that, good profits a.s.sured to him, the farmer would bustle up and produce more.”

”Can you see him bustling up?” he answered with a laugh; ”organizing himself into a body, and working the thing out from the point of view of the public weal? I'll tell you what nine-tenths of him would do: grow just as much or little as suited his own purposes; and then go to sleep.

And Protection would be his security against ever being awakened.”

”I'm afraid you don't like him,” Joan commented.