SECRET HISTORY
Under succeeding administrations, each pledged to a larger policy to
themselves and a smaller one towards every one else, most of the
traditional outward forms of government had continued to be observed.
Thus there was a Minister for the Colonies, though the Colonies
themselves had shamefacedly one by one dropped off into the troubled
waters of weak independence, or else clung on with pathetic loyalty in
spite of rebuff after rebuff, and the disintegration of all mutual
interests, until nothing but the most shadowy bond remained. There was a
Secretary of State for War in spite of the fact that the flag which the
Government nailed to the mast when it entered into negotiations with an
aggrieved and aggressive Power, bore the legend, "Peace at any Price.
None but a Coward Strikes the Weak." There had been more than one First
Lord of the Admiralty whose maritime experience had begun and ended on
the familiar deck of the _Koh-I-Noor_. There were practically all the
usual officers of ministerial rank--and the recipients of ministerial
salaries.
Apart from the enjoyment of the title and the salary, however, there
were a few members of the Cabinet who exercised no real authority. Lord
Henry Stokes had been the last of upper class politicians of standing to
accept office under the new _regime_. Largely in sympathy with the
democratic tendency of the age, optimistic as to the growth of
moderation and restraint in the ranks of the mushroom party, and
actuated by the most sterling patriotism, Lord Henry had essayed the
superhuman task of premiership. Superhuman it was, because no mortal
could have combined the qualities necessary for success in the face of
the fierce distrust and jealousy which his rank and social position
excited in the minds of the rawer recruits of his own party; superhuman,
because no man possessing his convictions could have long reconciled
with them the growing and not diminishing illiberality of those whom he
was to lead. There were dissensions, suspicions, and recriminations from
the first. The end came in a tragic scene, unparalleled among the many
historic spectacles which the House has witnessed. A trivial point in
the naval estimates was under discussion, and Lord Henry, totally out of
sympathy with the bulk of his nominal following, had risen to patch up
the situation on the best terms he could. At the end of a studiously
moderate speech, which had provoked cheers from the opposition and
murmurs of dissent from his own party throughout, he had wound up his
plea for unity, toleration, and patriotism, with the following words:
"It is true that here no Government measure is at stake, no crisis is
involved, and honourable members on this side of the House are free of
party trammels and at liberty to vote as seems best to each. But if the
motion should be persisted in, an inevitable conclusion must be faced,
an irretrievable step will have been taken, and of the moral outcome of
that act who dare trace the end?"
There was just a perceptible pause of sullen silence, then from among
the compact mass that sat behind their leader rose a coarse voice,
charged with a squiggling laugh.
"We give it up, 'Enry. If it's a riddle about morals, suppose you ask
little Flo?"
It was an aside--it was afterwards claimed that it was a drunken
whisper--but it was heard, as it was meant to be heard, throughout the
crowded Chamber. From the opposition ranks there was torn a cry, almost
of horror, at the enormity of the insult, at the direful profanation of
the House. Responsible members of the Government turned angrily,
imploringly, frantically upon their followers. At least half of these,
sitting pained and scandalised, needed no restraint, but from the
malcontents and extreme wings came shriek upon shriek of boisterous
mirth, as they rocked with laughter about their seats. As for Lord
Henry, sitting immobile as he scanned a paper in his hand, he did not
appear to have heard at first, nor even to have noticed that anything
unusual was taking place. But the next minute he turned deadly pale,
began to tremble violently, and with a low and hurried, "Your help,
Meadowsweet!" he stumbled from the Hall.
For twenty years he had been a member of the House, years of
full-blooded politics when party strife ran strong, but never before had
the vaguest innuendo from that deep-seared, unforgotten past dropped
from an opponent's lips. It had been reserved for his own party to
achieve that distinction and to exact the crowning phase of penance in
nature's inexorable cycle.
Apologists afterwards claimed that too much had been made of the
incident--that much worse things were often said, and passed, at the
meetings of Boards of Guardians and Borough Councils. It was as true as
it was biting: worse things were said at Borough Councils, and the
Mother of Parliaments had sunk to the rhetorical level of a Borough
Council.
Stokes never took his seat again, and with him there passed out of that
arena the last of a hopeful patriotic group, whose only failure was that
they tried to reconcile two irreconcilable forces of their times.
It did not result, however, that no men of social position were to be
found among the Labour benches. There was a demand, and there followed
the supply. Rank, mediocrity, and moral obsequiousness were the
essentials for their posts. There were no more Stokeses to be had, so
obliging creatures were obtained who were willing for a consideration to
be paraded as the successors to his patriotic mantle. They were plainly
made to understand their position, and if they ventured to show
individuality they soon resigned. Nominally occupying high offices, they
had neither influence, power, nor respect; like Marlborough in
compliance they had "to do it for their bread." They were ruled by their
junior lords, assistants, and underlings in various degrees. Many of
these men, too strong to be ignored, were frankly recognised to be
impossible in the chief offices of State. As a consequence the Cabinet
soon became an empty form. Its councils were still held, but the
proceedings were cut and dried in advance. The real assembly that
dictated the policy of the Government was the Expediency Council, held
informally as the necessity arose.
The gathering which was taking place at the Premier's house on this
occasion had been convened for the purpose of clearing the air with
regard to the policy to be pursued at home. The Government had come into
power with very liberal ideas on the question of what ought to be done
for the working classes. They had made good their promises, and still
that free and enlightened body, having found by experience that they
only had to ask often enough and loudly enough to be met in their
demands, were already clamouring for more. The most moderate section of
the Government was of opinion that the limit had been reached; others
thought that the limit lay yet a little further on; the irresponsibles
denied that any limit could be fixed at all. That had been the
experience of every administration for a long time past, and each one in
turn had been succeeded by its malcontents.
Mr Strummery, the Premier, did not occupy the official residence
provided for him. Mrs Strummery, an excellent lady who had once been
heard to remark that she could never understand why her husband was
called _Prime Minister_ when he was not a _minister_ at all, flatly
declared that the work of cleaning the windows alone of the house in
Downing Street put it out of the question. Even Mr Strummery, who, among
his political associates, was reported to have rather exalted ideas of
the dignity of his position, came to the conclusion, after fully
considering the residence from every standpoint, that he might not feel
really at home there. It was therefore let, furnished, to an American
lady who engineered wealthy _debutantes_ from her native land into "the
best" English society, and the Strummerys found more congenial
surroundings in Brandenburg Place. There, within a convenient distance
of the Hampstead Road and other choice shopping centres, Mrs Strummery,
like the wife of another eminent statesman whose statue stood almost
within sight of her bedroom windows, was able to indulge in her amiable
foible for cheap marketing. And if the two ladies had this in common,
the points of resemblance between their respective lords (the moral side
excluded) might be multiplied many-fold, for no phrase put into Mr
Strummery's mouth could epigrammatise his point of view more concisely
than Fox's inopportune toast, "Our Sovereign: the People." History's
dispassionate comment was that the sentiment which lost the abler man
his Privy Councillorship in his day, gained for the other a Premiership
a century later.
"One thing that gets me is why no one ever seems to take any notice of
us when we have a Council on," remarked the President of the Board of
Education with an involuntary plaint in his voice. He was standing on
the balcony outside the large front room on Mr Strummery's first
floor--a room which boasted the noble proportions of a _salon_, and
possibly served as one in Georgian days. Certainly Brandenburg Place did
not present a spectacle of fluttering animation at the prospect of
seeing the great ones of the land assembling within its bounds. At one
end of the thoroughfare a milkman was going from area to area with a
prolonged melancholy cry more suggestive of Stoke Poges churchyard than
of any other spot on earth; at the opposite end a grocer's errand boy,
with basket resourcefully inverted upon his head, had sunk down by the
railings to sip the nectar from a few more pages of "Iroquois Ike's Last
Hope; or, The Phantom Cow-Puncher's Bride." Midway between the two a
cat, in the act of crossing the road, had stopped to twitch a forepaw
with that air of imperturbable deliberateness in its movements that no
other created thing can ever succeed in attaining. In a house opposite
some one was rattling off the exhilarating strains of "Humming Ephraim,"
but even when a hansom cab and two four-wheelers drove up in quick
succession to the Premier's door, no one betrayed curiosity to the
extent of looking out of the window. The Minister of Education noted
these things as he stood on the balcony, and possibly he felt another
phase of the gratitude of men that often left Mr Wordsworth mourning. "I
can remember the time when crowds used to wait hours in the rain along
Downing Street--our people, too--to catch a sight of Estair or
Nettlebury. I won't exactly say that it annoys me, because I've seen too
much of the hollowness of things for that, but it certainly is rummy why
it should be so."
"A very good thing, too," commented the Premier briskly from the room.
"I don't know that we could have a greater compliment. The people know
that we are plain, straightforward men like themselves, and they know
that we are doing our work without having to come and see us at it. They
don't regard us almost as little deities--interesting to see, but quite
different and above themselves. That's why."
Every one in the room said "Hear! Hear!" as though that exactly defined
his own sentiments; and every one in the room looked rather sad, as
though at the back of their collective minds there lurked a doubt
whether it might not be more pleasant to be regarded almost as little
deities.
"You needn't go as far back as Estair and Nettlebury," put in Vossit of
the Treasury. "See how they fairly 'um round Hampden whenever he's
about."
"Not us," interposed another man emphatically. "Let them go on their own
messin' way; it'll do us no harm. You never saw a working man at any of
their high and mighty meetings."
"So much the worse, for they didn't want them. But there ought to have
been working men there, from the very first meeting until now." The
speaker was one of the most recent additions to the potent circle of the
Brandenburg Place councils, and the freedom of criticism which he
allowed himself had already been the subject of pained comment on the
part of a section of his seniors.
"Well," suggested some one, with politely-pointed meaning, "I don't know
what's to prevent one individual from attending a meeting if he so
wants. He'd probably find one going on somewhere at this minute if he
looked round hard. Doesn't seem to me that any one's holding him back."
"Now, now," reproved Mr Guppling, the Postmaster-General, "let the man
speak if he has anything on his mind. Come now, comrade, what do you
mean?"
"I don't know what I mean," replied the comrade, at which there was a
general shout of laughter. "I don't know what I mean," he continued,
having secured general attention by this simple device of oratory,
"because I am told in those Government quarters where I ought to be able
to find information, that no information has been collected, no
systematic enquiries made, nothing is known, in fact. Therefore, I do
not know what I mean because I do not know--none of us know--what the
Unity League means. But I know this: that a hostile organisation of over
a million and a half strong----"
Dissent came forcibly from every quarter of the room. "Not half!" was
the milder form it took.
"----of over a million and a half strong," continued the speaker
grimly--"perhaps more, in fact, than all our Trades Unions put
together--with an income very little less than what all the Trades
Unions put together used to have, and funds in hand probably more, is a
living menace in our midst, and ought to have been closely watched."
"It keeps 'em quiet," urged the Foreign Under-Secretary.
"Too quiet. I don't like my enemy to be quiet. I prefer him to be
talking large and telling us exactly what he's going to do."
"They're going to chuck us out, Tirrel; that's what they're going to
do," said a sarcastic comrade playfully. "So was the Buttercup League,
so was the Liberal-Conservative alliance. Lo, history repeats itself!"
"I see a long line of strong men fallen in the past--premiers, popes,
kings, generals, ambassadors," replied Tirrel. "They all took it for
granted that when they had got their positions they could keep them
without troubling about their enemies any more. That's generally the
repeating point in history."
Mr Strummery felt that the instances were perhaps getting too near home.
"Come, come, chaps, and Comrade Tirrel in particular," he said mildly,
"don't imagine that nothing is being done in the proper quarter because
you mayn't hear much talk about it. Our Executives work and don't talk.
I think that you may trust our good comrade Tubes to keep an eye on the
Unity League."
"Wish he'd keep an eye on the clock," murmured a captious member. "Not
once," he added conclusively, "but three times out of four."
There was a vigorous knock at the front door, and the hurried footsteps
of some one ascending the stairs with the consciousness that he was
late.
"Talk of Tubes and you'll have a puncture," confided a comrade of
humorous bent to his neighbour, and on the words the Home Secretary,
certainly with very little breath left in him, entered the room and made
his apologies.
The special business for which the Council had been called together was
to consider a series of reports from the constituencies, and to decide
how to be influenced by their tenor. The Government had no desire to
wait for a general election in order to find out the views of the
electors of the country; given a close summary of those sentiments, it
might be possible to fall in with their wishes, and thereby to be spared
the anxiety of an election until their septennial existence had run its
course; or, if forced by the action of their own malcontents to take
that unwelcome step, at least to cut the ground from beneath their
opponents' feet in advance.
If there was not complete unanimity among those present, there was no
distinct line of variance. Men of the extremest views had naturally not
been included, and although the prevailing opinion was that the
conditions of labour had been put upon a fair and equitable basis during
their tenure of office--or as far in that direction as it was possible
to go without utterly stampeding capitalists and ratepayers from the
country--there were many who were prepared to go yet a little further if
it seemed desirable.
Judging from the summarised reports, it did seem desirable. From the
mills of Lancashire and Yorkshire, the coal-pits of the north and west,
the iron fields of the Midlands, the quarries of Derbyshire, the boot
factories of Northampton and the lace factories of Nottingham, from
every swarming port around the coast, and from that vast cosmopolitan
clearing house, the Capital itself, came the same tale. The people did
not find themselves so well off as they wished to be; they were, in
fact, rather poorer than before. There was nothing local about it. The
Thurso flag-stone hewer shared the symptoms with his Celtic brother,
digging out tin and copper from beneath the Atlantic waters beyond
Pendeen; the Pembroke dock-hand and the Ipswich mechanic were in just
the same position. When industries collapsed, as industries had an
unhappy character for doing about the period, no one had any reserves.
It was possible to live by provision of the Government, but the working
man had been educated up to requiring a great deal more than bare
living. When wages went down in spite of all artificial inflation, or
short time was declared, a great many working-class houses, financed
from week to week but up to the hilt in debt, went down too. The
agricultural labourer was the least disturbed; he had had the least done
for him, and he had never known a "boom." The paradox remained that with
more money the majority of the poor were poorer than before, and they
were worse than poor, for they were dissatisfied. The remedy, of course,
was for some one to give them still more money, not for them to spend
less. The shortest way to that remedy, as they had been well taught by
their agitators in the past, was to clamour for the Government to do
something else for them, and therefore they were clamouring now.
"That is the position," announced Mr Tubes, when he had finished reading
the general summary. "The question it raises may not be exactly urgent,
but it is at least pressing. On the one hand, there is the undoubted
feeling of grievance existing among a large proportion of electors--our
own people. On the other hand, there is the serious question of national
finances not to be overlooked. As the matter is one that must ultimately
concern me more closely than anybody else, I will reserve my own opinion
to the last."
The view taken by those present has already been indicated. Their
platform was that of Moderate Socialism; they wished it always to be
understood that they were practical. They had the interest of their
fellow working men (certainly of no other class of the community) at
heart, but as Practical Socialists they had a suspicion (taking the
condition of the Exchequer into consideration) that for the moment they
had reached the limit of Practical Socialism. There was an undoubted
dilemma. If a mistake of policy on their part let in the impractical
Socialists, the result would be disastrous. Most of them regarded the
danger as infinitesimal; like every other political party during the
last two centuries, they felt that they could rely on the "sound
common-sense of the community." Still, admitting a possibility, even if
it was microscopic, might it not be more--say practically socialistic
(the word "patriotic" had long been expunged from their vocabulary) in
the end to make some slight concessions? If there existed a more
material inducement it was not referred to, and any ingenuous comrade,
using as an argument in favour of compliance a homely proverb anent the
inadvisability of quarrelling with one's bread and butter, would have
been promptly discouraged. Yet, although the actors themselves in this
great morality play apparently overlooked the consideration, it is
impossible for the spectator to ignore the fact. Some few members of the
Cabinet might have provided for a rainy day, but even to many of
official class, and practically to all of the rank and file, a reversal
at the polls must mean that they would have to give up a variety of
highly-esteemed privileges and return to private life in less
interesting capacities, some in very humble ones indeed.
It ended, as it was bound to end, in compromise. They would not play
into the hands of the extreme party and ignore the voice of the
constituencies; they would not be false to their convictions and be
dictated to by the electors. They would decline to bring in the
suggested Minimum Wage Bill, and they would not impose the Personal
Property Tax. They would meet matters by extending the National
Obligations Act, and save money on the Estimates. They would be sound,
if commonplace.
The formal proceedings having been concluded, it was open for any one to
introduce any subject he pleased in terms of censure, enquiry or
discussion. Comrade Tirrel was on his feet at once, and returned to the
subject that lay heavy on his mind.
"Is the Home Secretary in possession of any confidential information
regarding the Unity League?" he demanded; "and can he assure us, in view
of the admittedly hostile object of the organisation, that adequate
means are being taken to neutralise any possible lines of action it may
adopt?"
"The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative,"
replied Mr Tubes in his best parliamentary manner. "As regards the
second part, I may state that after considering the reports we have
received it is not anticipated that the League offers any serious menace
to the Government. Should the necessity arise, the Council may rely upon
the Home Office taking the requisite precautions."
"The answer is satisfactory as far as it goes. Being in possession of
special information, will the Home Secretary go a step further and allay
the anxiety that certainly exists in some quarters, by indicating the
real intentions and proposed _modus operandi_ of the League?"
Mr Tubes conferred for a moment with his chief. "I may say that on broad
lines the League has no definite plan for the future, and its
intentions, as represented by the policy of its heads, will simply be to
go on existing so long as the deluded followers will continue their
subscriptions. I may point out that the League has now been in existence
for two years, and during that time it has done nothing at all to
justify its founders' expectations; it has not embarrassed us at any
point nor turned a single by-election. For two years we heard
practically nothing of it, and there has been no fresh development to
justify the present uneasiness which it seems to be causing in the minds
of a few nervous comrades. Its membership is admittedly imposing, but
the bare fact that a million and a half of people are foolish
enough----"
There was a significant exchange of astonished glances among the
occupants of Mr Strummery's council chamber. Murmurs grew, and Mr
Guppling voiced the general feeling by calling the Home Secretary's
attention to the figures he had mentioned "doubtless inadvertently."
"No," admitted Mr Tubes carelessly, "that is our latest estimate. From
recent information we have reason to think that the previous figure we
adopted was too low--or the League may have received large additions
lately through some accidental cause. We are now probably erring as
widely on the other side, but it is the safe side, and I therefore
retain that figure."
Mr Tirrel had not yet finished, but he was listened to with respectful
attention now.
"Is the Home Secretary in a position to tell us who this man Salt is?"
was his next enquiry.
The Home Secretary looked frankly puzzled. "Who _is_ Salt?" he replied,
innocently enough.
"That is the essential point of my enquiry," replied the comrade.
"Salt," he continued, his voice stilling the laughter it had raised, "is
the Man behind the Unity League. You think it is Hampden, but I tell you
that you are mistaken. Hampden is undoubtedly a dangerous power; the
classes will follow him blindly, and he is no mere figure-head, but it
was Salt who stirred Hampden from his apathy, and it is Salt who pulls
the wires."
"And who is Salt?" demanded the Premier, as Mr Tubes offered no comment.
Tirrel shook his head. "I know no more than I have stated," he replied;
"but his secret influence must be tremendous, and all doubt as to the
identity of the man and his past record should be set at rest."
Mr Tubes looked up from the papers he had before him with a gleam of
subdued anger in his eye. "I think that our cock-sure kumred has geete
howd of another mare's neest," he remarked, relapsing unconsciously into
his native dialect as he frequently did when stirred. "I remember
hearin' o' this Saut in one o' th' reports, and here it is. So far from
being a principal, he occupies a very different position--that of
Hampden's private secretary, which would explain how he might have to
come into contact with a great many people without having any real
influence hissel. He is described in my confidential report as a simple,
unsuspicious man, who might be safely made use of, and, in fact, most of
my information is derived from that source."
There was a sharp, smothered exclamation from one or two men, and then a
sudden stillness fell upon the room. Mr Tubes was among the last to
realise the trend of his admission.
"Are we to understand that the greater part--perhaps the whole--of the
information upon which the Home Office has been relying, and of the
assurances of inaction which have lulled our suspicions to rest, have
been blindly accepted from this man Salt, the head and fount of the
League itself?" demanded Tirrel with ominous precision. "If that
indicates the methods of the Department, I think that this Council will
share my view when I suggest that the terms 'simple' and 'unsuspicious'
have been inaccurately allotted--to Salt."
Mr Tubes made no reply. Lying at the bottom of the man's nature
smouldered a volcanic passion that he watched as though it were a
sleeping beast. Twice in his public career it had escaped him, and each
time the result had been a sharp reverse to his ambitions.
Repression--firm, instant, and unconditional--was the only safeguard, so
that now recognising the danger-signal in his breast, he sat without a
word in spite of the Premier's anxious looks, in spite of the concern of
those about him.
"I will not press for a verbal reply," continued Tirrel after a telling
pause; "the inference of silence makes that superfluous. But I will ask
whether the Home Secretary is aware that Salt has been quietly engaged
in canvassing the provinces for a month, and whether he has any
information about his object and results. Yes," he continued vehemently,
turning to those immediately about him, "for a month past this simple,
unsuspecting individual from whom we derive our confidential information
has been passing quietly and unmarked from town to town; and if you were
to hang a map of England on the wall before me, I would undertake to
trace his route across the land by the points of most marked discontent
in the report to which we have just listened."
A knock at the locked door of the room saved the Home Secretary for the
moment from the necessity of replying. It was an unusual incident, and
when the nearest man went and asked what was wanted, some one was
understood to reply that a stranger, who refused to give his name,
wished to see Mr Tubes. Perhaps Mr Tubes personally might have welcomed
a respite, but the master of the house anticipated him.
"Tell him, whoever he may be, that Mr Tubes cannot be disturbed just
now," he declared.
"He says it's important, very important," urged the voice, with a
suggestion of largess received and more to come, in its eagerness.
"Then let him write it down or wait," said Mr Strummery decisively, and
the matter was supposed to have ended.
The momentary interruption had broken the tension and perhaps saved
Tubes from a passionate outburst. He rose to make a reply without any
sign of anger or any fear that he would not be able to smooth away the
awkward impression.
"As far as canvassing in the provinces is concerned," he remarked
plausibly, "it is open for any man, whatever his politics may be, to do
that from morning to night all his life if he likes, so long as it isn't
for an illegal object. As regards Salt having been engaged this way for
the past month, it is quite true that I have had no intimation of the
fact so far. I may explain that as my Department has not yet come to
regard the Unity League as the one object in the world to which it must
devote its whole attention, I am not in the habit of receiving reports
on the subject every day, nor even every week. It may be, however----"
There was another knock upon the door. Mr Tubes stopped, and the Premier
frowned. In the space between the door and the carpet there appeared for
a second a scrap of paper; the next moment it came skimming a few yards
into the room. There was no attempt to hold further communication, and
the footsteps of the silent messenger were heard descending the stairs
again.
Mr Vossit, who sat nearest to the door, picked up the little oblong
card. He saw, as he could scarcely fail to see, that it was an ordinary
visiting-card, and on the upper side, as it lay, there appeared a
roughly-pencilled sign--two lines at right angle drawn through a
semicircle, it appeared superficially to be. As he handed it to Mr Tubes
he reversed the position so that the name should be uppermost, and again
he saw, as he could scarcely fail to see, that the other side was blank.
The roughly-pencilled diagram was all the message it contained.
"It may be, however----" the Home Secretary was repeating
half-mechanically. He took the card and glanced at the symbol it bore.
"It may be, however," he continued, as though there had been no
interruption, "that I shall very soon be in possession of the full facts
to lay before you." Then with a few whispered words to the Premier and a
comprehensive murmur of apology to the rest of the company, he withdrew.
Fully a quarter of an hour passed before there was any sign of the
absent Minister, and then it did not take the form of his return. The
conversation, in his absence, had worked round to the engaging
alternative of whether it was more correct to educate one's son at Eton
or at Margate College, when a message was sent up requesting the
Premier's attendance in another room. After another quarter of an hour
some one was heard to leave the house, but it was ten minutes later
before the two men returned. It was felt in the atmosphere that some new
development was at hand, and they had to run the curious scrutiny of
every eye. Both had an air of constraint, and both were rather pale. The
Premier moved to his seat with brusque indifference, and one who knew
Tubes well passed a whispered warning that Jim had got his storm-cone
fairly hoisted. The door was locked again, chairs were drawn up to the
table, and a hush of marked expectancy settled over the meeting.
The Prime Minister spoke first.
"In the past half-hour a letter has come into our possession that may
cause us to alter our arrangements," he announced baldly. "How it came
into our possession doesn't matter. All that does matter is, that it's
genuine. Tubes will read it to you."
"It is signed 'John Hampden,' addressed to Robert Estair, and dated
three days ago," contributed the Home Secretary just as briefly. "The
original was in cipher. This is the deciphered form:
"'MY DEAR ESTAIR,--I now have Salt's complete report before me,
and there seems to be no doubt that the proposal I have
formulated is feasible, and the moment almost ripe. Salt has
covered all the most important industrial centres, and
everywhere the reports of our agents are favourable to the
plan. Not having found universal happiness and a complete
immunity from the cares incident to humanity in the privileges
which they so ardently desired and have now obtained, the
working classes are tending to believe that the panacea must
lie, not in greater moderation, but in extended privilege.
"'For the moment the present Government is indisposed to go
much further, not possessing the funds necessary for enlarged
concessions and fearing that increased taxation might result in
a serious stream of emigration among the monied classes. For
the moment the working men hesitate to throw in their lot with
the extreme Socialists, distrusting the revolutionary and
anarchical wing of that party, and instinctively feeling that
any temporary advantage which they might enjoy would soon be
swallowed up in the reign of open lawlessness that must
inevitably arise.
"'For the moment, therefore, there is a pause, and now occurs
the opportunity--perhaps the last in history--for us to
retrieve some of the losses of the past. There are scruples to
be overcome, but I do not think that an alliance with the
moderate section of the Labour interest is inconsistent with
the aims and traditions of the great parties which our League
represents. It would, of course, be necessary to guarantee to
our new allies the privileges which they now possess, and even
to promise more; but I am convinced, not only by past
experience but also by specific assurances from certain
quarters, that they would prefer to remain as they are, and
form an alliance with us rather than grasp at larger gains and
suffer absorption into another party which they dare not trust.
"'From the definite nature of this statement you will gather
that the negotiations are more than in the air. The
distribution of Cabinet offices will have to be considered at
once. B---- might be first gained over with the offer of the
Exchequer. He carries great weight with a considerable section
of his party, and is dissatisfied with his recognition so far.
Heape is a representative man who would repay early attention,
especially as he is, at the moment, envious of R----'s better
treatment. But these are matters of detail. The great thing is
to _get back on any terms_. Once in power, by a modification of
the franchise we might make good our position. I trust that
this, a desperate remedy in a desperate time, will earn at
least your tacit acquiescence. Much is irretrievably lost;
England remains--yet.
"Yours sincerely,
"JOHN HAMPDEN.'"
Six men were on their feet before the signature was reached. With an
impatient gesture Strummery waved them collectively aside.
"We all know your opinion on the writer and the letter, and we can all
put it into our own words without wasting time in listening," he said
with suppressed fury. "In five minutes' time I shall entirely reopen the
consideration of the reports which we met this afternoon to discuss."
"Has any effort been made to learn the nature of Estair's reply?"
enquired Tirrel. If he was not the least moved man in the room he was
the least perturbed, and he instinctively picked out the only point of
importance that remained.
"It probably does not exist in writing," replied Mr Tubes, avoiding
Tirrel's steady gaze. "I find that he arrived in town last night. There
would certainly be a meeting."
"Was Bannister summoned to this Council?" demanded another. It was taken
for granted that "B" stood for Bannister.
"Yes," replied the Premier, with one eye on his watch. "He was
indisposed."
"I protest against the reference to myself," said Heape coldly.
* * * * *
Mr Strummery nodded. "Time's up," he announced.
That is the "secret history" of the Government's sudden and inexplicable
conversion to the necessity of the Minimum Wage Bill and to the
propriety of imposing the Personal Property Tax. A fortnight later the
Prime Minister outlined the programme in the course of a speech at
Newcastle. The announcement was received almost with stupefaction. For
the first time in history, property--money, merchandise, personal
belongings--was to be saddled with an annual tax apart from, and in
addition to, the tax it paid on the incomes derived from it. It was an
entire wedge of the extreme policy that must end in Partition. It was
more than the poorer classes had dared to hope; it was more than the
tax-paying classes had dared to fear. It marked a new era of extended
privilege for the one; it marked the final extinction of hope even among
the hopeful for the other.
"It could not have happened more opportunely for us even if we had
arranged it in every detail," declared Hampden, going into Salt's room
with the tidings in huge delight, a fortnight later.
"No," agreed Salt, looking up with his slow, pleasant smile. "Not even
if we had arranged it."