‘No better than downright robbery,’ Lord Connemara answered. ‘Shaking the very foundations of society, I think it. All done so recklessly, too, without any care or any consideration.’
Ernest thought of old Max Schurz, with his lifelong economical studies, and wondered when Lord Connemara had found time to turn his own attention from foxes and fishing to economical problems; but, by a perfect miracle, he said nothing.
‘You wouldn’t believe the straits we’re put to, Lady Exmoor,’ the Irish Earl went on, ‘through this horrid no-rent business. Absolute poverty, I assure you—absolute downright poverty. I’ve had to sell the Maid of Garunda this week, you know, and three others of the best horses in my stable, just to raise money for immediate necessities. Wanted to buy a most interesting missal, quite unique in its way, offered me by Menotti and Cicolari, dirt cheap, for three thousand guineas. It’s quite a gem of late miniaturist art—vellum folio, with borders and head-pieces by Giulio Clovio. A marvellous bargain!’
‘Giulio Clovio,’ said Lord Exmoor, doubtfully. ‘Who was he? Never heard of him in my life before.’
‘Never heard of Giulio Clovio!’ cried Lord Connemara, seizing the opportunity with well-affected surprise. ‘You really astonish me. He was a Croatian, I believe, or an Illyrian—I forget which—and he studied at Rome under Giulio Romano. Wonderful draughtsman in the nude, and fine colourist; took hints from Raphael and Michael Angelo.’ So much he had picked up from Menotti and Cicolari, and, being a distinguished connoisseur, had made a mental note of the facts at once, for future reproduction upon a fitting occasion. ‘Well, this missal was executed for Cardinal Farnese, as a companion volume to the famous Vita Christi in the Towneley collection. You know it, of course, Lady Exmoor?’
‘Of course,’ Lady Exmoor answered faintly, with a devout hope that Lord Connemara wouldn’t question her any further upon the subject; in which case she thought it would probably be the safest guess to say that she had seen it at the British Museum or in the Hamilton Library.
But Lord Connemara luckily didn’t care to press his advantage. ‘The Towneley volume, you see,’ he went on fluently—he was primed to the muzzle with information on that subject—‘was given by the Cardinal to the Pope of that time—Paul the Third, wasn’t it, Mr. Le Breton?—and so got into the possession of old Christopher Towneley, the antiquary. But this companion folio, it seems, the Cardinal wouldn’t let go out of his own possession; and so it’s been handed down in his own family (with a bar sinister, of course, Exmoor—you remember the story of Beatrice Malatesta?) to the present time. It’s very existence wasn’t suspected till Cicolari—wonderfully smart fellow, Cicolari—unearthed it the other day from a descendant of the Malatestas, in a little village in the Campagna. He offered it to me, quite as an act of friendship, for three thousand guineas; indeed, he begged me not to let Menotti know how cheap he was selling it, for fear he might interfere and ask a higher price for it. Well, I naturally couldn’t let such a chance slip me—for the credit of the family, it ought to be in the collection—and the consequence was, though I was awfully sorry to part with her, I was absolutely obliged to sell the Maid for pocket-money, Lady Hilda—I assure you, for pocket-money. My tenants won’t pay up, and nothing will make them. They’ve got the cash actually in the bank; but they keep it there, waiting for a set of sentimentalists in the House of Commons to interfere between us, and make them a present of my property. Rolling in money, some of them are, I can tell you. One man, I know as a positive fact, sold a pig last week, and yet pretends he can’t pay me. All the fault of these horrid communists that you were speaking of, Lady Exmoor—all the fault of these horrid communists.’
‘You’re rather a communist yourself, aren’t you, Mr. Le Breton?’ asked Lady Hilda boldly from across the table. ‘I remember you told me something once about cutting the throats of all the landlords.’
Lady Exmoor looked as though a bomb-shell had dropped into the drawing-room. ‘My dear Hilda,’ she said, ‘I’m sure you must have misunderstood Mr. Le Breton. You can’t have meant anything so dreadful as that, Mr. Le Breton, can you?’
‘Certainly not,’ Ernest answered, with a clear conscience. ‘Lady Hilda has put her own interpretation upon my casual words. I haven’t the least desire to cut anybody’s throat, even metaphorically.’