‘I don’t deny it. I was very nigh drowning at the time, and it was the first plank I caught hold of. I am very grateful to him for the rescue; but I owe him more gratitude for the opportunity the incident gave me to see these men in their intimacy—to know, and know thoroughly, what is the range, what the stamp of those minds by which states are ruled and masses are governed. Through Walpole I knew his master; and through the master I have come to know the slipshod intelligences which, composed of official detail, House of Commons’ gossip, and Times’ leaders, are accepted by us as statesmen. And if—’ A very supercilious smile on Nina’s mouth arrested him in the current of his speech, and he said, ‘I know, of course, I know the question you are too polite to ask, but which quivers on your lip: “Who is the gifted creature that sees all this incompetence and insufficiency around him?” And I am quite ready to tell you. It is Joseph Atlee—Joseph Atlee, who knows that when he and others like him—for we are a strong coterie—stop the supply of ammunition, these gentlemen must cease firing. Let the Débats and the Times, the Revue des Deux Mondes and the Saturday, and a few more that I need not stop to enumerate, strike work, and let us see how much of original thought you will obtain from your Cabinet sages! It is in the clash and collision of the thinkers outside of responsibility that these world-revered leaders catch the fire that lights up their policy. The Times made the Crimean blunder. The Siècle created the Mexican fiasco. The Kreuz Zeitung gave the first impulse to the Schleswig-Holstein imbroglio; and if I mistake not, the “review” in the last Diplomatic Chronicle will bear results of which he who now speaks to you will not disown the parentage.’
‘The saints be praised! here’s dinner,’ exclaimed Kearney, ‘or this fellow would talk us into a brain-fever. Kate is dining with Miss Betty again—God bless her for it,’ muttered he as he gave his arm to Nina, and led the way.
‘I’ve got you a commission as a “peeler,” Dick,’ said Joe, as they moved along. ‘You’ll have to prove that you can read and write, which is more than they would ask of you if you were going into the Cabinet; but we live in an intellectual age, and we test all the cabin-boys, and it is only the steersman we take on trust.’
Though Nina was eager to resent Atlee’s impertinence on Walpole, she could not help feeling interested and amused by his sketches of his travels.
If, in speaking of Greece, he only gave the substance of the article he had written for the Revue des Deux Mondes, as the paper was yet unpublished all the remarks were novel, and the anecdotes fresh and sparkling. The tone of light banter and raillery in which he described public life in Greece and Greek statesmen, might have lost some of its authority had any one remembered to count the hours the speaker had spent in Athens; and Nina was certainly indignant at the hazardous effrontery of the criticisms. It was not, then, without intention that she arose to retire while Atlee was relating an interesting story of brigandage, and he—determined to repay the impertinence in kind—continued to recount his history as he arose to open the door for her to pass out. Her insolent look as she swept by was met by a smile of admiration on his part that actually made her cheek tingle with anger.
Old Kearney dozed off gently, under the influence of names of places and persons that did not interest him, and the two young men drew their chairs to the fire, and grew confidential at once.
‘I think you have sent my cousin away in bad humour,’ said Dick.
‘I see it,’ said Joe, as he slowly puffed his cigar. ‘That young lady’s head has been so cruelly turned by flattery of late, that the man who does not swing incense before her affronts her.’
‘Yes; but you went out of your way to provoke her. It is true she knows little of Greece or Greeks, but it offends her to hear them slighted or ridiculed; and you took pains to do both.’
‘Contemptible little country! with a mock-army, a mock-treasury, and a mock-chamber. The only thing real is the debt and the brigandage.’