It was not an easy position for boys used to the conversation and habits of the wealthiest society in the world. But much was done for them. Edward was married to the half-witted daughter of Sir John Garstang the cotton-spinner; Henry was put into the Scotch Education Office; Philip died, and Charlie, in spite of the mistake about Mr. Isaacs, would have done very well out of Lord Burpham if his incorrigible Irish character had not run away with him and with the motor-car of that eminent director of our Foreign Affairs. "Irish," I say, for Ireland was apparent in all that poor Charlie did, for though his mother was of pure German stock and strongly Protestant, while his accent was that of Eton College, yet his friends could easily descry in all his extravagances and escapades the adventurous Irish influence of his grandfather's estate. His cousins, through the Baileys (who were of pure English or Indian lineage), Jim in the Foreign Office and "Nobby" who had means and was, after a spell in the Heralds' College, at large, the Steynings and the rest, saw this Hibernian brilliance more clearly than any, and made it a permanent if insufficient excuse for his vagaries.
It was Boswell Delacourt who first suggested politics to Charlie Fitzgerald, and Fate did the rest.
Boswell Delacourt was not exactly a relative of Charlie Fitzgerald's, except in so far as everybody can be said to be related to everybody else; he was no more than a connection by marriage. But he did think it hard that a man of Mr. Clutterbuck's antecedents and position should stand aloof from political life. Nowhere can money be more usefully spent for the country than in the support of great political ideals, and nowhere can the wide experience and hard mental training of a commercial career do more for England than in the House of Commons. Nor did any one appreciate these truths more than Boswell Delacourt, nor did any of the younger people who were working in the organisation of the National Party work harder than he to spread them abroad. He hammered at Fitzgerald, and Fitzgerald did his duty.
The new Secretary had passed the whole summer without a word of complaint, cooped up in the new house at Caterham; he had spent his energies in suggesting the purchase of books, the removal of pictures, and the renaming of the estate; he had recommended horses, cigars, wines, traps, motors, and jewellery, and sold them again with ready decision when he thought them unworthy; he had attended to all the correspondence, signed nearly all the cheques, received payment against all exchanges, and spared his host every sort of financial worry; he had compelled not a few of his own friends, in spite of their intense reluctance, to spend Saturday to Monday under that roof; with noble perseverance he had run the light Panhard himself for incredible distances and at a speed which Mr. Clutterbuck could hardly bear; he had done all these things for nearly two months without a respite, when, late in September, having forsworn all opportunities to shoot, he tackled the great affair.
It was in the second smoking-room some time before dinner that the elder man and the younger sipping sherry and bitters, began their fateful conversation.
Charlie Fitzgerald first introduced the business—and he launched it fair and clean, for when Mr. Clutterbuck had said in a ruminating sort of way "The days are drawing in, Mr. Fitzgerald," Charlie Fitzgerald had answered:
"Yes—— Why don't you send something to the Party Funds?"
Since his secretary had been in the house, Mr. Clutterbuck had authorised not a few large cheques, and had let Charlie sign many more. He wondered what new claim this might be, but he hardly liked to venture an opinion. He thought it better to wait a moment and let time or the goddess Chance illuminate him.
"You see, after all," said Fitzgerald, spreading out one hand towards the fire, "they expect it ... don't they?" he asked sympathetically, looking up sideways in Mr. Clutterbuck's face.