Coddling the Prime Minister
Parliament was to meet on the 12th of February, and it was of course necessary that there should be a Cabinet Council before that time. The Prime Minister, about the end of the third week in January, was prepared to name a day for this, and did so, most unwillingly. But he was then ill, and talked both to his friend the old Duke and his private Secretary of having the meeting held without him. "Impossible!" said the old Duke.
"If I could not go it would have to be possible."
"We could all come here if it were necessary."
"Bring fourteen or fifteen ministers out of town because a poor creature such as I am is ill!" But in truth the Duke of St. Bungay hardly believed in this illness. The Prime Minister was unhappy rather than ill.
By this time everybody in the House,—and almost everybody in the country who read the newspapers,—had heard of Mr. Lopez and his election expenses,—except the Duchess. No one had yet dared to tell her. She saw the newspapers daily, but probably did not read them very attentively. Nevertheless she knew that something was wrong. Mr. Warburton hovered about the Prime Minister more tenderly than usual; the Duke of St. Bungay was more concerned; the world around her was more mysterious, and her husband more wretched. "What is it that's going on?" she said one day to Phineas Finn.
"Everything,—in the same dull way as usual."
"If you don't tell me, I'll never speak to you again. I know there is something wrong."
"The Duke, I'm afraid, is not quite well."
"What makes him ill? I know well when he's ill and when he's well. He's troubled by something."