CHAPTER LXV
IN TOWN
Lord Danesbury had arrived at Bruton Street to confer with certain members of the Cabinet who remained in town after the session, chiefly to consult with him. He was accompanied by his niece, Lady Maude, and by Walpole, the latter continuing to reside under his roof, rather from old habit than from any strong wish on either side.
Walpole had obtained a short extension of his leave, and employed the time in endeavouring to make up his mind about a certain letter to Nina Kostalergi, which he had written nearly fifty times in different versions and destroyed. Neither his lordship nor his niece ever saw him. They knew he had a room or two somewhere, a servant was occasionally encountered on the way to him with a breakfast-tray and an urn; his letters were seen on the hall-table; but, except these, he gave no signs of life—never appeared at luncheon or at dinner—and as much dropped out of all memory or interest as though he had ceased to be.
It was one evening, yet early—scarcely eleven o’clock—as Lord Danesbury’s little party of four Cabinet chiefs had just departed, that he sat at the drawing-room fire with Lady Maude, chatting over the events of the evening’s conversation, and discussing, as men will do at times, the characters of their guests.
‘It has been nearly as tiresome as a Cabinet Council, Maude!’ said he, with a sigh, ‘and not unlike it in one thing—it was almost always the men who knew least of any matter who discussed it most exhaustively.’
‘I conclude you know what you are going out to do, my lord, and do not care to hear the desultory notions of people who know nothing.’
‘Just so. What could a First Lord tell me about those Russian intrigues in Albania, or is it likely that a Home Secretary is aware of what is preparing in Montenegro? They get hold of some crotchet in the Revue des Deux Mondes, and assuming it all to be true, they ask defiantly, “How are you going to deal with that? Why did you not foresee the other?” and such like. How little they know, as that fellow Atlee says, that a man evolves his Turkey out of the necessities of his pocket, and captures his Constantinople to pay for a dinner at the “Frères.” What fleets of Russian gunboats have I seen launched to procure a few bottles of champagne! I remember a chasse of Kersch, with the café, costing a whole battery of Krupp’s breech-loaders!’
‘Are our own journals more correct?’
‘They are more cautious, Maude—far more cautious. Nine days’ wonders with us would be too costly. Nothing must be risked that can affect the funds. The share-list is too solemn a thing for joking.’