'If,' said he, in a well-assumed indignant tone of injured innocence, 'there be any in the club who do suspect me of anything unbecoming a gentleman in this affair, I am willing to retire from it till the matter shall have been investigated; but in such case I demand that the investigation be immediate.'
Oh, Undy, Undy, the supply of cheek is not bad; it is all but unlimited; but yet it suffices thee not. 'Can there be positions in this modern West End world of mine,' thought Undy to himself, 'in which cheek, unbounded cheek, will not suffice?' Oh, Undy, they are rare; but still there are such, and this, unfortunately for thee, seemeth to be one of them.
And then got up a discreet old baronet, one who moveth not often in the affairs around him, but who, when he moveth, stirreth many waters; a man of broad acres, and a quiet, well-assured fame which has grown to him without his seeking it, as barnacles grow to the stout keel when it has been long a-swimming; him, of all men, would Undy have wished to see unconcerned with these matters.
Not in many words, nor eloquent did Sir Thomas speak. 'He felt it his duty,' he said, 'to second the proposal made by Mr. Scott for removing Mr. Tudor from amongst them. He had watched this trial with some care, and he pitied Mr. Tudor from the bottom of his heart. He would not have thought that he could have felt so strong a sympathy for a man convicted of dishonesty. But, Mr. Tudor had been convicted, and he must incur the penalties of his fault. One of these penalties must, undoubtedly, be his banishment from this club. He therefore seconded Mr. Scott's proposal.'
He then stood silent for a moment, having finished that task; but yet he did not sit down. Why, oh, why does he not sit down? why, O Undy, does he thus stand, looking at the surface of the table on which he is leaning?
'And now,' he said, 'he had another proposition to make; and that was that Mr. Undecimus Scott should also be expelled from the club,' and having so spoken, in a voice of unusual energy, he then sat down.
And now, Undy, you may as well pack up, and be off, without further fuss, to Boulogne, Ostend, or some such idle Elysium, with such money-scrapings as you may be able to collect together. No importunity will avail thee anything against the judges and jurymen who are now trying thee. One word from that silent old baronet was worse to thee than all that Mr. Chaffanbrass could say. Come! pack up; and begone.
But he was still a Member of Parliament. The Parliament, however, was about to be dissolved, and, of course, it would be useless for him to stand again; he, like Mr. M'Buffer had had his spell of it, and he recognized the necessity of vanishing. He at first thought that his life as a legislator might be allowed to come to a natural end, that he might die as it were in his bed, without suffering the acute pain of applying for the Chiltern Hundreds. In this, however, he found himself wrong. The injured honour of all the Tillietudlemites rose against him with one indignant shout; and a rumour, a horrid rumour, of a severer fate met his ears. He applied at once for the now coveted sinecure,—and was refused. Her Majesty could not consent to entrust to him the duties of the situation in question—; and in lieu thereof the House expelled him by its unanimous voice.
And now, indeed, it was time for him to pack and begone. He was now liable to the vulgarest persecution from the vulgar herd; his very tailor and bootmaker would beleaguer him, and coarse unwashed bailiffs take him by the collar. Yes, now indeed, it was time to be off.
And off he was. He paid one fleeting visit to my Lord at Cauldkail Castle, collecting what little he might; another to his honourable wife, adding some slender increase to his little budget, and then he was off. Whither, it is needless to say—to Hamburg perhaps, or to Ems, or the richer tables of Homburg. How he flourished for a while with ambiguous success; how he talked to the young English tourists of what he had done when in Parliament, especially for the rights of married women; how he poked his 'Honourable' card in every one's way, and lugged Lord Gaberlunzie into all conversations; how his face became pimply and his wardrobe seedy; and how at last his wretched life will ooze out from him in some dark corner, like the filthy juice of a decayed fungus which makes hideous the hidden wall on which it bursts, all this is unnecessary more particularly to describe. He is probably still living, and those who desire his acquaintance will find him creeping round some gambling table, and trying to look as though he had in his pocket ample means to secure those hoards of money which men are so listlessly raking about. From our view he has now vanished.