So the picture formed itself; and the last bit to fit in, and thereby to give completeness, was what I had seen that night—the strange complaisance of Octon toward the intolerable Powers. Did Octon smoke his pipe in Powers's house and drink Powers's whisky for nothing? That "friendly glass"—what was its significance?
This was work for a spy or a detective. I thrust the idea away from me. But the idea would not depart. A man must use his senses—nay, they use themselves. The more I sought to banish the explanation, the more insolently it seemed to stare me in the face. "Pick a hole in me, if you can!" it challenged. The hole was hard to pick.
CHAPTER XI
THE SIGNAL AT "DANGER"
Alison lost little time in making his promised attack on Jenny; he was not the man to let the grass grow under his feet. It might be improper to say that he chose the wrong moment—for no moment could be wrong from his point of view, and the one most wrong from a worldly aspect might well be to his mind the supremely right. Yet according to that purely worldly standpoint the time was unfortunate. Jenny had a great many other things to think of—very pressing things: as to many of us, so to her, her religious position perhaps seemed a matter which could wait. Moreover—by a whimsical chance—the Rector ran up against another difficulty: to Jenny it was a refuge, of which she availed herself with her usual dexterity. When one attack pressed her, I am convinced that she absolutely welcomed the advent of another from the opposite direction. Between the two she might slip out unhurt; at any rate, if one assailant called on her to surrender, she could bid him deal with the other first. The analogy is not exact—but there was a family likeness between her balancing of Fillingford against Octon and the way in which, assailed by Alison, she interposed, as a shield, the views urged on her by Mrs. Jepps. Displayed in a less serious campaign—less serious, I mean, to Jenny's thinking—yet it was, in essence, the same strategy—and it was a strategy pretty to watch. Be it remarked that Jenny was busy keeping friends with everybody during these anxious weeks.
Mrs. Jepps—if I have said it before, it will bear repetition—was a power in Catsford, in the town itself. She might be said to lead the distinctively town society. Age, wealth, character, and a certain incisiveness of speech combined to strengthen her position. She was a small old lady, with plentiful white hair; she had been pretty—save for a nose too big; in her old age she bore a likeness to Cardinal Newman, but it would never have done to tell her so—she would as soon have been compared to the Prince of Darkness himself. For she was a most pronounced Evangelical, and her feud with Alison was open and inveterate. She disapproved profoundly of "the parish clergyman"; she called him by that title, whereas he called himself "the priest in charge"; for his "assistant priests" she would know no name but "curates." There had been an Education Question lately; the fight had waxed abnormally hot over the souls—almost over the bodies—of Catsford urchins, male and female, themselves somewhat impervious to the bearings of the controversy. Into deeper differences it is not necessary to go. The Rector thought her one of the best women he knew, but one of the most wrong-headed. Put man for woman—and she exactly reciprocated his opinion; and it is hard to deny, though sad to admit, that her zeal for Jenny's spiritual awakening was stirred to greater activity by the knowledge that Alison had put his hand to the alarm. To use a homely metaphor, they were each exceedingly anxious that the awakened sleeper should get out on what was, given their point of view, the right side of the bed.
To Jenny—need I say it?—this situation was rich in possibilities of staying in bed. In response to appeals she might put one foot out on one side, then the other foot out on the other; she would think a long while before she trusted her whole body to the floor either on the right or on the left. She did not appreciate in the least the fiery zeal which urged her to one side or the other: but she knew that it was there and allowed for its results. To her mind she had two friends—while she lay in bed; a descent on either side might cost her one of them. While she hesitated, she was precious to both. For the rest, I believe that she found a positive recreation in this ecclesiastical dispute; to play off Mrs. Jepps against Alison was child's play compared to the much more hazardous and difficult game on which she was embarked. Child's play—and byplay; yet not, perhaps, utterly irrelevant. It would have been easy to say "A plague on both your houses!" But even Mercutio did not say that till he was wounded to death, and Jenny was more of a politician than Mercutio. She asked both houses to dinner—and took pains that they should meet.
They met several times—with more pleasure to Mrs. Jepps than to the Rector. He fought for conscience' sake, and for what he held true. So did she—but the old lady liked the fighting for its own sake also. Jenny's attitude was "I want to understand." She pitted them against one another—Mrs. Jepps's "Letter of the Scriptures" against Alison's "Voice of the Living Church," his "Primitive Usage and Teaching of the Fathers" against her "Protestantism and Reformation Settlement." It is not necessary to deny to Jenny an honest intellectual interest in these and kindred questions, although her concern did not go very deep—but for her an avowed object always gained immensely in attraction from the possibility of some remoter and unavowed object attaching to it. If the avowed object of these prolonged discussions was the settlement of Jenny's religious convictions, the remoter and unavowed was to keep herself still in a position to reward whichever of the disputants she might choose finally to hail as victor. Policy and temperament both went to foster this instinct in her; the position might be useful, and was enjoyable; her security might be increased, her vanity was flattered. Jenny stayed in bed!
In secular politics her course was no less skillfully taken. She did indeed declare herself a Conservative—there was no doubt, even for Jenny's cautious mind, about the wisdom of that step—and gave Bertram Ware a very handsome contribution toward his Registration expenses; the expenses were heavy, Ware was not a rich man, and he was grateful. But at that time the question of Free Trade against Protection—or Free Imports against Fair Trade, if those terms be preferred—was just coming to the front, under the impetus given by a distinguished statesman. Fillingford, the natural leader of the party in the county division, was a convinced Free Trader. Ware had at least a strong inclination for Fair Trade. After talks with Fillingford and talks with Ware, Jenny gave her contribution, but accompanied it by an intimation that she hoped Mr. Ware would do nothing to break up the party. The hint was significant. Between the two sections which existed, or threatened to exist, in her party, Jenny—with her estate and her money—became an object of much interest. They united in giving her high rank in their Primrose League—but neither of them felt sure of her support.