“Indeed, I don’t.”
“Then I’ll be downright, sir. To the point, sir. Will you be our candidate?”
“What?” Vaughan cried. He turned very red. “What do you mean?”
“What I said, sir. Will you be our candidate? For the Bill, the whole Bill, and nothing but the Bill? If so, we shall not say a word until to-morrow and then we shall nominate you with Mr. Wrench, and take ’em by surprise. Eh? Do you see? They’ve got their speeches ready full of my lord’s interference and my lord’s dictation, and they will point to Colonel Petty, my lord’s cousin, for proof! And then,” Mr. Pybus winked, much after the fashion of a mischievous paroquet, “we’ll knock the stool from under ’em by nominating you! And, mind you, Mr. Vaughan, we are going to win. We were hopeful before, for we’ve one of their men in gaol, and another, Pillinger of the Blue Duck, is tied by the leg. His wife owes a bit of money and thinks more of fifty guineas in her own pocket than of thirty pounds a year in her husband’s. And she and the doctor have got him in bed and will see that he’s not well enough to vote! Ha! Ha! So there it is, Mr. Vaughan! There it is! My lord’s offer, not mine. I believe he’d word from London what you’d be likely to do. Only he felt a delicacy about moving—until you declared yourself.”
“I see,” Vaughan replied. And indeed he did see more than he liked.
“Just so, sir. My lord’s a gentleman if ever there was one!” And Mr. Pybus, pulling down his waistcoat, looked as if he suspected that he had imbibed much of his lordship’s gentility.
Vaughan stood, thinking; his eyes gazing into the shimmering depths of green where the branches of the chestnut tree under which he stood swept the sun-kissed turf. And as he thought he tried to still the turmoil in his brain. Here within reach of his hand, to take or leave, was that which had been his ambition for years! No longer to play at the game, no longer to make believe while he addressed the Forum or the Academic that he was addressing the Commons of England; but verily and really to be one of that august body, and to have all within reach. Had not the offer of cabinet honours fallen to Lord Palmerston at twenty-five? And what Lord Palmerston had done at twenty-five, he might do at thirty-five! And more easily, if he gained a footing before the crowd of new members whom the Bill would bring in, took the floor. The thought set his pulse a-gallop. His chance! His chance at last! But if he let it slip now, it might not be his for long years. It is poor work waiting for dead men’s shoes.
And yet he hesitated, with a flushed face. For the thing offered without price or preface, by a man who had power to push him, by the man who even now was pushing Mr. Macaulay at Calne, tempted him sorely. Nor less—nor less because he remembered with bitterness that Sir Robert had made him no such offer, and now never would! So that if he refused this offer, he could look for no second from either side!
And yet he could not forget that Sir Robert was his kinsman, was the head of his family, the donor of his vote. And in the night watches he had decided that, his mind delivered, his independence declared, he would not vote. Neither for Sir Robert—for conscience’s sake; nor against Sir Robert, for his name’s sake!
Then how could he not only take an active part against him, but raise his fortunes on his fall?