"Oh, rot!" said the Caterpillar.
The Manor got into the semi-finals of the football matches, and when the School broke up for the Christmas holidays it was generally conceded that the fortunes of the ancient house were mending. In the Manor itself Warde's influence was hardly yet perceptible: only a very few knew that it was diffusing itself, percolating into nooks and crevices undreamed of: the hearts of the Fourth Form, for instance. In Dirty Dick's time there had been almost universal slackness. In pupil-room Rutford read a book; boys could work or not as they pleased, provided their tutor was not disturbed. Warde, on the other hand, made it a point of honour to work with his pupils. His indefatigable energies, his good humour, his patience, were never so conspicuous as when he was coaching duffers. In other ways he made the boys realize that he was at the Manor for their advantage, not his own. The gardens and park were kept strictly private by Dirty Dick. Warde threw them open: a favour hardly appreciated in the whiter quarter, but the House admitted that it would be awfully jolly in the summer to lie under the trees far from the "crowd." In a word—a "privilege."
Upon the last Saturday, to John's delight, Desmond asked him to spend a week in Eaton Square. John had paid two visits to White Ladies; he was now about to experience something entirely new. White Ladies and Verney Boscobel were typical of the past; they illustrated the history of the families who had inhabited them. The great world went to White Ladies to see the pictures and the gardens, the Gobelin tapestries, the Duchess and her guests; but the same world dined in Eaton Square to see Charles Desmond.
During this visit, our John first learned what miracles one individual may accomplish. At White Ladies, he had dimly perceived, as has been said, the duties and responsibilities imposed upon rank and wealth. In Eaton Square he saw more plainly the duties and responsibilities imposed upon a man of great talents. Both Charles Desmond and the Duke of Trent were hard workers, but the labours of the duke seemed to John (and to other wise persons) drab-coloured. Charles Desmond's work, in contrast, presented all the colours of the spectrum. John left White Ladies, thanking his stars that he was not a duke; he came away from Eaton Square filled with the ambition to be Private Secretary to the great Minister. And when Mr. Desmond said to him with his genial smile, "Well, young John, Harry, I hope, will be my secretary, and the crutch of my declining years. But what would you like to be?" John replied fervently, "Oh, sir, I should like to be Harry's understudy."
"Would you?"
And then John saw the face of his kind host change. The smile faded. Mr. Desmond had taken his answer as John meant it to be taken—seriously. He examined John as if he were already a candidate for office. The piercing eyes probed deep. Then he said slowly, "I should like to have you under me, John. We shall talk of this again, my boy. My own sons——" He paused, sighed, and then laughed, tapping John's cheek with his slender, finely-formed fingers. But he passed on without finishing his sentence. John knew that, of Cæsar's brothers, Hugo, the eldest, was Secretary of Legation at Teheran; Bill "devilled" for a famous barrister; Lionel wore her Majesty's livery. Strange that none had elected to serve his own father! Cæsar explained later.
"You see," he said, "the dear old governor outshines everybody. Hugo and the others felt that under him they would be in eclipse, for ever and ever—eh?"
"I see," said John, gravely. "Yes, there's something in that. He wants you, Cæsar."
"Dear old governor!" the other replied. "Yes—he's keen on that. But I hope to make my own little mark. I'd like to have my name on a brass tablet in Harrow Chapel; that would be something." His eyes began to glow and sparkle.
Next day, at dinner, Rodney's name cropped up.