Keeling found no difficulty in deciphering the handwriting. There were three pages, and glancing through them, he moved towards the door.
‘Nothing whatever about the ceremony to-morrow,’ he said.
He went to his library and gave a more detailed perusal to what Lord Inverbroom had to say. It was a disagreeable letter to read, and he felt that the writing of it had been disagreeable to its author. It informed him that since Lord Inverbroom had put his name up for election into the County Club, he had become aware that there were a considerable number of members who would certainly vote against his election. Lord Inverbroom had spoken to various of these, but had not succeeded in mitigating their opposition and was afraid that his candidate would certainly not be elected. In these circumstances did Mr Keeling wish him to withdraw his name or not? He would be entirely guided by his wishes. He added a very simple and sincere expression of his regret at the course events had taken.
Keeling read this through once and once again before he passed to the consideration of the answer he would make to it. He found that it said very disagreeable things inoffensively, which seemed to him a feat, knowing that if he wrote a letter containing disagreeable news, the tone of his letter would be disagreeable also. He could not quite understand how it was done, but certainly he felt no kind of offence towards the writer.
But the contents were another matter, and they both annoyed him excessively, and kindled in him a blaze of defiance. He would much have liked to know who were these members for whom he was not good enough, and whose opposition Lord Inverbroom had been unable to mitigate. But as far as withdrawing his candidature went for fear of the result of the election, or acquainting Lord Inverbroom of the fact that as purchaser of the property he had the ex officio privilege of being a member, such craven notions never entered his head. If sufficient members to secure his rejection, objected to him, they should record their objections: he was not going to withdraw on the chance of their doing so. He had never yet abandoned a business proposition for fear of competition, and it seemed to him that to withdraw his name was somehow parallel to being frightened out of a deal. Judging from the purely business standpoint (and there was his mistake) he expected to find that a large quantity of this supposed opposition was bluff. Besides, before the election came on, it would be known who had given the new wing to the hospital, and pulled the committee out of a quagmire of rotten finance: it would be known too, that whether the County Club thought him a suitable occupant of the bow-window that looked on Alfred Street, his Sovereign thought him good enough to go into dinner before any of them except Lord Inverbroom. He was no snob himself, but he suspected that a good many other people were.
Accordingly even before the gong sounded for lunch, he had finished a note in answer to Lord Inverbroom’s as follows:—
‘Dear Lord Inverbroom,—I am obliged for your favour just to hand, and regret I was out. I should be obliged if you would kindly fulfil the engagement you entered into with me, and put me up for election as agreed. I do not in the least fear the result of the election, and so trust you may be in error about it.
‘Faithfully yours,
‘Thomas Keeling.’
This he read through before posting it. It was a sound business letter, saying just what it set out to say. But he wondered why it lacked that certain aroma of courtesy which distinguished the letter which it answered. He perceived that it was so, but no more knew how to remedy it than he knew how to fly. But he could walk pretty sturdily along the ground, and it required a stalwart push to upset him. And if the undesirable happened, and Lord Inverbroom’s fears proved to be well founded, he knew he had a sound knock ready for the whole assembly of those who collectively thought he was not good enough for them.
‘I’ll find an answer that’s good enough for them,’ he said to himself, as he slipped the letter into his post-box.