“Cheap at double the price. My governor will take every bottle of it.”
“Not before I leave, I hope,” said O'Shea, laughing. “I trust he 'll respect what they call vested interests.”
“Oh, by the way,” said the other, indolently, “you are going?”
“Yes. Our party are getting uneasy, and I am constantly receiving letters pressing me to return to England.”
“Want you in the House, perhaps?” said Heathcote, as he puffed his cigar in lazy enjoyment.
“Just so. You see, a parliamentary session is a sort of campaign in which every arm of warfare is needed. You want your great guns for the grand battles, your dashing cavalry charges for emergencies, and your light skirmishers to annoy the enemy and disconcert his advance.”
“And which are you?” asked the other, in a tone of bantering indifference.
“Well, I 'm what you might call a mounted rifleman,—a dash of the dragoon with a spice of the sharpshooter.”
“Sharp enough, I take it,” muttered Heathcote, who bethought him of the billiard-table, and the wonderful “hazards” O'Shea used to accomplish.
“You understand,” resumed the Member, confidentially, “I don't come out on the Budget, or Reform, or things of that kind; but I lie by till I hear some one make a blunder or a mistake, no matter how insignificant, and then I 'm down on him, generally with an anecdote—something he reminds me of—and for which I 'm sure to have the laugh against him. It's so easy, besides, to make them laugh; the worst jokes are always successful in the House of Commons.”