His Honour, and a Lady

  CHAPTER IV.

  “I don’t mind telling you,” said Philip Doyle, knocking the ashes out ofhis pipe, “that, personally, His Acting Honour represents to me a numberof objectionable things. He is a Radical, and a Low Churchman, and aParticularist. He’s that objectionable ethical mixture, a compound ofpetty virtues. He believes this earth was created to give him anatmosphere to do his duty in; and he does it with the invincible courageof short-sightedness combined with the notion that the ultimate court ofappeal for eighty million Bengalis should be his precious Methodistconscience. But the brute’s honest, and if he insists on putting thisUniversity foolishness of his through, I’m sorry for him. He’s a deadman, politically, the day it is announced.”

  “He is,” replied Ancram, concentrating his attention on a match and theend of his cigar. “There’s—no doubt—about that.”

  The two men were smoking after dinner, with the table and a couple ofdecanters between them. Roses drooped over the bowl of Cutch silver thatgleamed in the middle of the empty cloth, and a lemon leaf or twofloated in the finger-glass at Ancram’s elbow. He threw the match intoit, and looked across at Doyle with his cigar between his teeth in themanner which invites further discussion.

  “In point of political morality I suppose he’s right enough——”

  “He generally is,” Ancram interrupted. “He’s got a scent for politicalmorality keen enough to upset every form of Government known to thenineteenth century.”

  “But they see political morality through another pair of spectacles inEngland. To withdraw State aid from education anywhere at this end ofthe century is as impracticable as it would be to deprive the Britishworkman of his vote. It’s retrogressive, and this is an age which willadmit anything except a mistake of its own.”

  “He doesn’t intend to withdraw State aid from education. He means tospend the money on technical schools.”

  “A benevolent intention. But it won’t make the case any better with theSecretary of State. He will say that it ought to be done withoutdamaging the sacred cause of higher culture.”

  “Damn the sacred cause of higher culture!” replied Ancram, with anunruffled countenance. “What has it done out here? Filled everysweeper’s son of them with an ambition to sit on an office stool and bea gentleman!—created by thousands a starveling class that find nothingto do but swell mass-meetings on the Maidan and talk sedition that getstelegraphed from Peshawur to Cape Comorin. I advertised for a baboo theother day, and had four hundred applications—fifteen rupees a month,poor devils! But the Dayes were a fortnight in getting a decent cook ontwenty.”

  “Bentinck should have thought of that; it’s too late now. You can’tbestow a boon on the masses in a spirit of progressiveness and take itaway sixty years later in a spirit of prudence. It’s decent enough ofChurch to be willing to bear the consequences of somebody else’sblunder; but blunders of that kind have got to take their place in theworld’s formation and let the ages retrieve them. It’s the only way.”

  “Oh, I agree with you. Church is an ass: he ought not to attempt it.”

  “Why do you fellows let him?”

  Ancram looked in Doyle’s direction as he answered—looked near him, fixedhis eyes, with an effect of taking a view at the subject round a corner,upon the other man’s tobacco-jar. The trick annoyed Doyle; he oftenwished it were the sort of thing one could speak about.

  “Nobody is less amenable to reason,” he said, “than the man who wants tohit his head against a stone wall, especially if he thinks the worldwill benefit by his inconvenience. And, to make matters worse, Churchhas complicated the thing with an idea of his duty toward the people athome who send out the missionaries. He doesn’t think it exactlyaccording to modern ethics that they should take up collections invillage churches to provide the salvation of the higher mathematics forthe sons of fat _bunnias_ in the bazar—who could very well afford to payfor it themselves.”

  “He can’t help that.”

  Ancram finished his claret. “I believe he has some notion of advertisingit. And after he has eliminated the missionary who teaches the Georgicsinstead of the Gospels, and devoted the educational grants to turningthe gentle Hindoo into a skilled artisan, he thinks the cause of higherculture may be pretty much left to take care of itself. He believes wecould bleed Linsettiah and Pattore and some of those chaps forendowments, I fancy, though he doesn’t say so.”

  “Better try some of the smaller natives. A maharajah won’t do much for aC. I. E. or an extra gun nowadays: it isn’t good enough. He knows thatall Europe is ready to pay him the honours of royalty whenever hechooses to tie up his cooking-pots and go there. He’ll save his moneyand buy hand-organs with it, or panoramas, or sewing-machines.Presently, if this adoration of the Eastern potentate goes on at home,we shall have the maharajah whom we propose to honour receiving ourproposition with his thumb applied to his nose and all his fingers out!”

  Ancram yawned. “Well, it won’t be a question of negotiating forendowments: it will never come off. Church will only smash himself overthe thing if he insists; and,” he added, as one who makes anunprejudiced, impartial statement on fatalistic grounds, “he willinsist. I should find the whole business rather amusing if, asSecretary, I hadn’t to be the mouthpiece for it.” He looked at hiswatch. “Half-past nine. I suppose I ought to be off. You’re not coming?”

  “Where?”

  “To Belvedere. A ‘walk-round,’ I believe.”

  “Thanks: I think not. It would be too much bliss for a corpulentgentleman of my years. I remember—the card came last week, and I gave itto Mohammed to take care of. I believe Mohammed keeps a special_almirah_ for the purpose; and in it,” Mr. Doyle continued gravely, “arethe accumulations of several seasons. He regards them as a trust onlysecond to that of the Director of Records, and last year he made themthe basis of an application for more pay.”

  “Which you gave him,” laughed Ancram, getting into his light overcoat asthe brougham rolled up to the door. “I loathe going; but for me there’sno alternative. There seems to be an Act somewhere providing that a manin my peculiar position must show himself in society.”

  “So long as you hover on the brink of matrimony,” said the other, “youmust be a butterfly. Console yourself: after you take the plunge you canturn ascidian if you like.”

  The twinkle went out of Philip Doyle’s eyes as he heard the carriagedoor shut and the wheels roll crunching toward the gate. He filled hispipe again and took up the _Saturday Review_. Half an hour later he waslooking steadily at the wall over the top of that journal, consideringneither its leading articles nor its reviews nor its advertisements, butMr. Lewis Ancram’s peculiar position.

  At that moment Ancram leaned against the wall in a doorway of thedrawing-room at Belvedere, one leg lightly crossed over the other, hisright hand in his pocket, dangling his eyeglass with his left. It wasone of the many casual attitudes in which the world was informed that aChief Secretary, in Mr. Ancram’s opinion, had no prescriptive right togive himself airs. He had a considering look: one might have said thathis mind was far from the occasion—perhaps upon the advisability of atobacco tax; but this would not have been correct. He was reallythinking of the quantity and the quality of the people who passed him,and whether as a function the thing could be considered a success. Withthe white gleam on the pillars, and the palms everywhere, and the movingvista of well-dressed women through long, richly-furnished roomsarranged for a large reception, it was certainly pretty enough; butthere was still the question of individuals, which had to be determinedby such inspection as he was bestowing upon them. It would have beenevident to anybody that more people recognised Ancram than Ancramrecognised; he had by no means the air of being on the look-out foracquaintances. But occasionally some such person as the Head of theTelegraph Department looked well at him and said, “How do, Ancram?” withthe effect of adding “I defy you to forget who I am!” or a lady ofmanner gave him a gracious and pronounced inclination, which
also said,“You are the clever, the rising Mr. Ancram. You haven’t called; but youare known to despise society. I forgive you, and I bow.” One or twoMembers of Council merely vouchsafed him a nod as they passed; but itwas noticeably only Members of Council who nodded to Mr. Ancram. Anaide-de-camp to the Viceroy, however—a blue-eyed younger son with hismind seriously upon his duty—saw Ancram in his path, and hesitated. Hehad never quite decided to what extent these fellows in the BengalSecretariat, and this one in particular, should be recognised by anaide-de-camp; and he went round the other way. Presently there was alittle silken stir and rustle, a parting of the ladies’ trains, and alull of observation along both sides of the lane which suddenly formeditself among the people. His Excellency the Viceroy had taken his earlyleave and was making his departure. Lord Scansleigh had an undisguisedappreciation of an able man, and there was some definiteness in the wayhe stopped, though it was but for a moment, and shook hands with Ancram,who swung the eyeglass afterwards more casually than he had done before.The aide-de-camp, following after, was in no wise rebuked. What theViceroy chose to do threw no light on his difficulty. He merely cast hiseyes upon the floor, and his fresh coloured countenance expressed arespectfully sad admiration for the noble manner in which his lorddischarged every obligation pertaining to the Viceregal office.

  The most privileged hardly cares to make demands upon his hostess aslong as she has a Viceroy to entertain, and Ancram waited until theirExcellencies were well on their way home, their four turbaned Sikhstrotting after them, before he made any serious attempt to find Mrs.Church. A sudden and general easefulness was observable at the sametime. People began to look about them and walk and talk with theconsciousness that it was no longer possible that they should besuspected of arranging themselves so that Lord Scansleigh _must_ bow.The Viceroy having departed, they thought about other things. She wasstanding, when presently he made his way to her, talking to Sir WilliamScott of the Foreign Department, and at the moment, to the Maharajah ofPattore. Ancram paused and watched her unperceived. It was like thepleasure of looking at a picture one technically understands. He notedwith satisfaction the subtle difference in her manner toward the twomen, and how, in her confidence with the one and her condescendingrecognition of the other’s dignity, both were consciously receivingtheir due. He noticed the colour of her heliotrope velvet gown, andasked himself whether any other woman in the room could possibly wearthat shade. Mentally he dared the other women to say that its simplicitywas over-dramatic, or that by the charming arrangement of her hair andher pearls and the yellowed lace, that fell over her shoulders JudithChurch had made herself too literal a representation of agreat-grandmother who certainly wore none of these things. He pausedanother second to catch the curve of her white throat as she turned herhead with a little characteristic lifting of her chin; and then he wentup to her. The definite purpose that appeared in his face was enough ofitself to assert their intimacy—to this end it was not necessary that heshould drop his eyeglass.

  “Oh,” she said, with a step forward, “how do you do! I began tothink——Maharajah, when you are invited to parties you always come, don’tyou? Well, this gentleman does not always come, I understand. I beg youwill ask a question about it at the next meeting of the LegislativeCouncil. The Honourable the Chief Secretary is requested to furnish anexplanation of his lamentable failure to perform his duties towardsociety.”

  The native smiled uncomfortably, puzzled at her audacity. His membershipof the Bengal Legislative Council was a new toy, and he was not surethat he liked any one else to play with it.

  “His Highness of Pattore,” said Ancram, slipping a hand under the fatelbow in its pink-and-gold brocade, “would be the very last fellow toget me into a scrape. Wouldn’t you, Maharaj!”

  His Highness beamed affectionately upon Ancram. There was, at allevents, nothing but flattery in being taken by the elbow by a ChiefSecretary. “Certainlie,” he replied—“the verrie last”; and he laughedthe unctuous, irresponsible laugh of a maharajah, which is accompaniedby the twinkling of pendant emeralds and the shaking of personalrotundities which cannot be indicated.

  Sir William Scott folded his arms and refolded them, balanced himselfonce or twice on the soles of his shoes, pushed out his under-lip, andretreated in the gradual and surprised way which would naturally beadopted by the Foreign Department when it felt itself left out of theconversation. The Maharajah stood about uneasily on one leg for amoment, and then with a hasty double salaam he too waddled away. Mrs.Church glanced after his retreating figure—it was almost a perfectoval—with lips prettily composed to seemly gravity. Then, as her eyesmet Ancram’s, she laughed like a schoolgirl.

  “Oh,” she said, “go away! I mustn’t talk to you. I shall be forgettingmy part.”

  “You are doing it well. Lady Spence, at this stage of the proceedings,was always surrounded by bank-clerks and policemen. I do not observe amember of either of those interesting species,” he said, glancing roundthrough his eyeglass, “within twenty yards. On the contrary, anexpectant Member of Council on the nearest sofa, the Commander-in-Chiefhovering in the middle distance, and a fringe of Departmental Heads onthe horizon.”

  “I do not see any of them,” she laughed, looking directly at Ancram. “Weare going to sit down, you and I, and talk for four or six minutes, asthe last baboo said who implored an interview with my husband”; and Mrs.Church sank, with just a perceptible turning of her shoulder upon theworld, into the nearest armchair. It was a wide gilded arm-chair,cushioned in deep yellow silk. Ancram thought, as she crossed her feetand leaned her head against the back of it, that the effect wasdelicious.

  “And you really think I am doing it well!” she said. “I have been dyingto know. I really dallied for a time with the idea of asking one of theaides-de-camp. But as a matter of fact,” she said confidentially,“though I order them about most callously, I am still horribly afraid ofthe aides-de-camp—in uniform, on duty.”

  “And in flannels, off duty?”

  “In flannels, off duty, I make them almond toffee and they tell me theirlove affairs. I am their sisterly mother and their cousinly aunt. Weeven have games of ball.”

  “They are nice boys,” he said, with a sigh of resignation: “I daresaythey deserve it.”

  There was an instant’s silence of good fellowship, and then she movedher foot a little, so that a breadth of the heliotrope velvet took on apaler light.

  “Yes,” he nodded, “it is quite—regal.”

  She laughed, flushing a little. “Really! That’s not altogether correct.It ought to be only officiating. But I can’t tell you how delicious itis to be _obliged_ to wear pretty gowns.”

  At that moment an Additional Member of Council passed them sothreateningly that Mrs. Church was compelled to put out a staying handand inquire for Lady Bloomsbury, who was in England, and satisfy herselfthat Sir Peter had quite recovered from his bronchitis, and warn SirPeter against Calcutta’s cold-weather fogs. Ancram kept his seat, butSir Peter stood with stout persistence, rooted in his rights. It wasonly when Mrs. Church asked him whether he had seen the new portrait,and told him where it was, that he moved on, and then he believed thathe went of his own accord. By the time an Indian official arrives at anAdditional Membership he is usually incapable of perceiving anythingwhich does not tend to enhance that dignity.

  “You have given two of my six minutes to somebody else, remember,”Ancram said. For an instant she did not answer him. She was lookingabout her with a perceptible air of having, for the moment, beenoblivious of something it was her business to remember. Almostimmediately her eye discovered John Church. He was in conversation withthe Bishop, and apparently they were listening to each other withdeference, but sometimes Church’s gaze wandered vaguely over the headsof the people and sometimes he looked at the floor. His hands wereclasped in front of him, his chin was so sunk in his chest that the mostconspicuous part of him seemed his polished forehead and his heavy blackeyebrows, his expression was that of a man who submits to the
inevitable. Ancram saw him at the same moment, and in the silence thatasserted itself between them there was a touch of embarrassment whichthe man found sweet. He felt a foolish impulse to devote himself toturning John Church into an ornament to society.

  “This sort of thing——” he suggested condoningly.

  “Bores him. Intolerably. He grudges the time and the energy. He saysthere is so much to do.”

  “He is quite right.”

  “Oh, don’t encourage him! On the contrary—promise me something.”

  “Anything.”

  “When you see him standing about alone—he is really veryabsent-minded—go up and make him talk to you. He will get your ideas—thetime, you see, will not be wasted. And neither will the general public,”she added, “be confronted with the spectacle of a Lieutenant-Governorwho looks as if he had a contempt for his own hospitality.”

  “I’ll try. But I hardly think my ideas upon points of administration arecalculated to enliven a social evening. And don’t send me now. TheBishop is doing very well.”

  “The Bishop?” She turned to him again, with laughter in the dark depthsof her eyes. “I realised the other day what one may attain to inCalcutta. His Lordship asked me, with some timidity, what I thought ofthe length of his sermons! Tell me, please, who is this madam bearingdown upon me in pink and grey?”

  Ancram was on his feet. “It is Mrs. Daye,” he said. “People who come solate ought not to insist upon seeing you.”

  “Mrs. Daye! Oh, of course; your——” But Mrs. Daye was clasping herhostess’s hand. “And Miss Daye, I think,” said Mrs. Church, lookingfrankly into the face of the girl behind, “whom I have somehow beendefrauded of meeting before. I have a great many congratulationsto—divide,” she went on prettily, glancing at Ancram. “Mr. Ancram is anold friend of ours.”

  “Thank you,” replied Miss Daye. Her manner suggested that at school suchacknowledgments had been very carefully taught her.

  “My dear, you should make a pretty curtsey,” her mother said jocularly,and then looked at Rhoda with astonishment as the girl, with an unmovedcountenance, made it.

  Ancram looked uncomfortable, but Mrs. Church cried out with vivacitythat it was charming—she was so glad to find that Miss Daye could unbendto a stranger; and Mrs. Daye immediately stated that she _must_ hearwhether the good news was true that Mrs. Church had accepted thepresidency—presidentship (what should one say?)—of the Lady DufferinSociety. Ah! that was delightful—now _everything_ would go smoothly.Poor dear Lady Spence found it _far_ too much for her! Mrs. Daye touchedupon a variety of other matters as the four stood together, and thegaslights shone down upon the diamond stars in the women’s hair, and theband played on the verandah behind the palms. Among them was thedifficulty of getting seats in the Cathedral in the cold weather, andthe fascinating prospect of having a German man-of-war in port for theseason, and that dreadful frontier expedition against the Nagapis; andthey ran, in the end, into an allusion to Mrs. Church’s delightfulThursday tennises.

  “Ah, yes,” Mrs. Church replied, as the lady gave utterance to this, withher dimpled chin thrust over her shoulder, in the act of departure: “youmust not forget my Thursdays. And you,” she said to Rhoda, with adirectness which she often made very engaging—“you will come too, Ihope?”

  “Oh, yes, thank you,” the girl answered, with her neat smile: “I willcome too—with pleasure.”

  “Why didn’t you go with them?” Mrs. Church exclaimed a moment later.

  Ancram looked meditatively at the chandelier. “We are not exactly ademonstrative couple,” he said. “She likes a decent reticence, Ibelieve—in public. I’ll find them presently.”

  They were half a mile on their way home when he began to look for them;and Mrs. Daye had so far forgotten herself as to comment unfavourablyupon his behaviour.

  “My dear mummie,” her daughter responded, “you don’t suppose I want tointerfere with his amusements!”