CHAPTER XXXVII.—ON THE DEFECTIVE LINK.
HAROLD had a note written to Mrs. Lampson, begging her to invite his friend, Mr. Archie Brown, to join her party at Abbeylands, almost before Mr. Playdell had left the street. He knew that his sister would be very glad to have Archie. All the world had a general notion of Archie’s millions; and Abbeylands was one of those immense houses that can accommodate a practically unlimited number of guests. The property had been bought from a nobleman, who had been brought to the verge of bankruptcy by trying to maintain it. Mr. Lampson, a patriotic American, had come to his relief, and had taken the place off his hands.
That is what all truly patriotic Americans do when they have an opportunity.
The new-world democracy comes to the rescue of the old-world aristocracy, and thus a venerable institution is preserved from annihilation.
Harold posted his letter as he went out to dine with a man who was a member of the Carlton Club, and zealous in heating up recruits for the Conservative party. He thought that Harold might possibly be open to conviction, not, of course, on the question of the righteousness of certain principles, but on the question of the direction in which the cat was about to jump. The jumping cat is the dominant power in modern politics.
Harold ate his dinner, and listened patiently to the man whose acquaintance with the tendencies of every genus of the political felis was supposed to be extraordinary. He said little. Before he had gone to Castle Innisfail the subject would have interested him greatly, but now he thought that Archie Brown’s inanities were preferable to those of the politician.
He was just enough to acknowledge, however, that the cigar with which he left the Carlton was as good a one as he had ever smoked. So that there was some advantage in being a Conservative after all.
He walked round St. James’s Square, for the night was warm and fine. His mind was not conscious of having received anything during the previous two hours upon which it would be profitable to ponder. He thought over the question which he had put to himself previously—the question of how he could bind Beatrice to him—how he could make her certainly his own, and thus banish that cold distrust of which he now and again became aware—no, it was not exactly distrust, it was only a slightly defective link in the chain of complete trust.
She loved him and she promised to love him. He reflected upon this, and he asked himself what more could he want. What bond stronger than her word could he desire to have?