The Dew of Their Youth

by S. R. Crockett

I will give the text of the Advocate’s reply in so far as it deals with Lalor: “Have as little as possible to do in a private capacity with ‘your Connection by Marriage’” (for so he continued to style him). “In public affairs we must often use sweeps to explore dark and tortuous passages. Persons who object to fyle themselves cannot be expected to clean drains. You take my metaphor? Your ‘Relative by Marriage’ has proved himself a useful artist in cesspools. That is all. He has not swept clean, but he has swept. He has, on several occasions, been useful to the Government when a better man would never have earned salt to his kail. Publicly, therefore, he is an estimable servant of the Government. Privately I would not touch him with the point of my shoe. For in personal relations such men are always dangerous. See to it that you and yours have as little to do with him as possible.”

There in a nutshell was the whole philosophy of politics. “For dirty jobs use dirty tools”—and of such undoubtedly was Lalor Maitland.

But I judged that, having come through so many vicissitudes, and moving now with a certain name and fame, he would, for his own sake, do us no open harm. Rather, as witness little Louis, he would exploit the ancient renown of the Maitlands, their standing in Galloway, and his friendship with the heir of their estates.

It seemed to me that Louis was entirely safe, especially in the good hands of the Lord Lieutenant, and that the great rewards which Lalor Maitland had received from the Government constituted in some measure the best security against any dangerous plotting.

And in all the electoral campaign that followed, certain it is that Lalor showed only his amiable side, taking all that was said against him with a smiling face, yet as ready with his sword as with his tongue, and so far as courage went (it must be allowed) in no way disgracing the old and well-respected name of the Maitlands of Marnhoul. But I must tell you of the fate which befell the jewel he had left in my hands for Irma. Whether it had ever belonged to the family of Maitland or not, I should greatly doubt. It was a hoop of rubies set with brilliants, which at will could make a bracelet for the wrist, or a kind of tiara for the hair. It was placed in a lined box of morocco leather, called an “ecrin,” and stood out as beautifully against the faded blue of the velvet as a little tangled wisp of sunset cloud lost in an evening sky.

But Irma flashed out when I showed it her.

“How dare you?” she cried, and seizing the box she shut it with a snap like her own white teeth. Then, the window being open, she threw it into the low shrubbery at the orchard end, whence, after she had gone to baby, I had no great trouble in recovering it. For it seemed to me too good to waste, and would certainly be of more use to me than to the first yokel who should pass that way.

Under ordinary circumstances Lalor would certainly have been defeated. First of all, though doubtless belonging to an ancient family of the country, he was, with his gilded coach and display of wealth gotten no one could just say how or where, in speech and look an outsider. His opponent, Colonel MacTaggart of the Stroan, called familiarly “The Cornel” was one of the brave, sound, stupid, jovial country gentlemen who rode once a week to market at Dumfries, never missed a Court day at Kirkcudbright, did his duty honourably in a sufficiently narrow round, and was worshipped by his tenantry, with whose families he was on terms of extraordinary fondness and friendship. Altogether, to use the vulgar idiom, “The Cornel” was felt to be a safe man to “bring back Galloway fish-guts to Galloway sea-maws.” Or, in other words, he would see to it that patronage, like charity, should begin at home—and stop there.

To set off against this, there was a strong feeling that Galloway had been long enough in opposition. There appeared to be (and indeed there was) no chance of overturning the Government. Why, then, should Galloway dwell for seven more years in the cold and hungry shades of opposition—able to growl, but quite unable to get the bone?

Lalor was brim-full of promises. He had been, if not a smuggler, at least an associate of smugglers, and all along Solwayside that was no disadvantage to him—in a country where all either dabbled in the illicit traffic, or, at best, looked the other way as the jingling caravans went by.