There was a vigorous knock at the front door, and the hurried footsteps of some one ascending the stairs with the consciousness that he was late.
"Talk of Tubes and you'll have a puncture," confided a comrade of humorous bent to his neighbour, and on the words the Home Secretary, certainly with very little breath left in him, entered the room and made his apologies.
The special business for which the Council had been called together was to consider a series of reports from the constituencies, and to decide how to be influenced by their tenor. The Government had no desire to wait for a general election in order to find out the views of the electors of the country; given a close summary of those sentiments, it might be possible to fall in with their wishes, and thereby to be spared the anxiety of an election until their septennial existence had run its course; or, if forced by the action of their own malcontents to take that unwelcome step, at least to cut the ground from beneath their opponents' feet in advance.
If there was not complete unanimity among those present, there was no distinct line of variance. Men of the extremest views had naturally not been included, and although the prevailing opinion was that the conditions of labour had been put upon a fair and equitable basis during their tenure of office—or as far in that direction as it was possible to go without utterly stampeding capitalists and ratepayers from the country—there were many who were prepared to go yet a little further if it seemed desirable.
Judging from the summarised reports, it did seem desirable. From the mills of Lancashire and Yorkshire, the coal-pits of the north and west, the iron fields of the Midlands, the quarries of Derbyshire, the boot factories of Northampton and the lace factories of Nottingham, from every swarming port around the coast, and from that vast cosmopolitan clearing house, the Capital itself, came the same tale. The people did not find themselves so well off as they wished to be; they were, in fact, rather poorer than before. There was nothing local about it. The Thurso flag-stone hewer shared the symptoms with his Celtic brother, digging out tin and copper from beneath the Atlantic waters beyond Pendeen; the Pembroke dock-hand and the Ipswich mechanic were in just the same position. When industries collapsed, as industries had an unhappy character for doing about the period, no one had any reserves. It was possible to live by provision of the Government, but the working man had been educated up to requiring a great deal more than bare living. When wages went down in spite of all artificial inflation, or short time was declared, a great many working-class houses, financed from week to week but up to the hilt in debt, went down too. The agricultural labourer was the least disturbed; he had had the least done for him, and he had never known a "boom." The paradox remained that with more money the majority of the poor were poorer than before, and they were worse than poor, for they were dissatisfied. The remedy, of course, was for some one to give them still more money, not for them to spend less. The shortest way to that remedy, as they had been well taught by their agitators in the past, was to clamour for the Government to do something else for them, and therefore they were clamouring now.
"That is the position," announced Mr Tubes, when he had finished reading the general summary. "The question it raises may not be exactly urgent, but it is at least pressing. On the one hand, there is the undoubted feeling of grievance existing among a large proportion of electors—our own people. On the other hand, there is the serious question of national finances not to be overlooked. As the matter is one that must ultimately concern me more closely than anybody else, I will reserve my own opinion to the last."
The view taken by those present has already been indicated. Their platform was that of Moderate Socialism; they wished it always to be understood that they were practical. They had the interest of their fellow working men (certainly of no other class of the community) at heart, but as Practical Socialists they had a suspicion (taking the condition of the Exchequer into consideration) that for the moment they had reached the limit of Practical Socialism. There was an undoubted dilemma. If a mistake of policy on their part let in the impractical Socialists, the result would be disastrous. Most of them regarded the danger as infinitesimal; like every other political party during the last two centuries, they felt that they could rely on the "sound common-sense of the community." Still, admitting a possibility, even if it was microscopic, might it not be more—say practically socialistic (the word "patriotic" had long been expunged from their vocabulary) in the end to make some slight concessions? If there existed a more material inducement it was not referred to, and any ingenuous comrade, using as an argument in favour of compliance a homely proverb anent the inadvisability of quarrelling with one's bread and butter, would have been promptly discouraged. Yet, although the actors themselves in this great morality play apparently overlooked the consideration, it is impossible for the spectator to ignore the fact. Some few members of the Cabinet might have provided for a rainy day, but even to many of official class, and practically to all of the rank and file, a reversal at the polls must mean that they would have to give up a variety of highly-esteemed privileges and return to private life in less interesting capacities, some in very humble ones indeed.
It ended, as it was bound to end, in compromise. They would not play into the hands of the extreme party and ignore the voice of the constituencies; they would not be false to their convictions and be dictated to by the electors. They would decline to bring in the suggested Minimum Wage Bill, and they would not impose the Personal Property Tax. They would meet matters by extending the National Obligations Act, and save money on the Estimates. They would be sound, if commonplace.
The formal proceedings having been concluded, it was open for any one to introduce any subject he pleased in terms of censure, enquiry or discussion. Comrade Tirrel was on his feet at once, and returned to the subject that lay heavy on his mind.
"Is the Home Secretary in possession of any confidential information regarding the Unity League?" he demanded; "and can he assure us, in view of the admittedly hostile object of the organisation, that adequate means are being taken to neutralise any possible lines of action it may adopt?"