FRIENDS IN COUNCIL.
After short silence then,
And summons sent, the great debate began.
A body constituted of as discordant elements as the three members of the
Salt Board was not likely to remain very long at peace with itself; and
for weeks past, Blunt's increasing truculence of deportment had warned
his colleagues of an approaching outbreak.
Since his successful raid upon the Board's accounts this gentleman had
made the lives of Fotheringham and Cockshaw a burden to them. His
insatiable curiosity plunged in the most ruthless manner into matters
which the others knew instinctively would not bear investigation. He
proposed reforms in an offhand manner which made poor Fotheringham's
hair stand on end; and the very perusal of his memoranda was more than
Cockshaw's industry could achieve. He had a sturdy cob on which he used
to ride about in the mornings, acquiring health and strength to be
disagreeable the entire day, and devising schemes of revolution as he
went. Poor Cockshaw's application for the Carraways had been refused;
General Beau had got the appointment and was actually in course of a
series of valedictory visits to various ladies whom he believed
broken-hearted at his departure. Fotheringham grew greyer and sadder day
by day and prepared himself as best he might to meet the blows of fate
in an attitude of dignified martyrdom. Matters at last reached a crisis
in a proposal of Blunt's, brought out in his usual uncompromising
fashion and thrust upon the Board, as Fotheringham acknowledged with a
shudder, with a horrid point-blank directness which rendered evasion and
suppression (the only two modes of dealing with questions which his
experience had taught him) alike impossible. In the first place Blunt
demonstrated by statistics that not enough salt was produced at the
Rumble Chunder quarries to enable the inhabitants to get enough to keep
them healthy. Nothing could be more convincing than his figures: so many
millions of people--so many thousands of tons of salt--so much salt
necessary per annum for each individual, and so forth. Then Blunt went
on to show that the classes of diseases prevalent in the Sandy Tracts
were precisely those which want of salt produces; then he demonstrated
that there was wholesale smuggling. From all this it followed obviously
that the great thing wanted was to buy up existing interests, develop
the quarries, improve the roads, and increase the production. If this
were done salt might be sold at a rate which would bring it within the
reach of all classes, and yet the gains of Government would be
increased. This was Blunt's view. The opposite party urged that to vary
the salt-supply would interfere with the laws of political economy,
would derange the natural interaction of supply and demand (this was one
of Fotheringham's favourite phrases), would depress internal trade,
paralyse existing industries, cause all sorts of unlooked-for results
and not benefit the consumer a whit; and that, even if it would, ready
money was not to be had at any price. Blunt, however, was not to be put
off with generalities and claimed to record his opinions, that his
colleagues should record theirs, and that the whole matter should be
submitted to the Agent. Cockshaw gave a suppressed groan, lit a cheroot,
and mentally resolved that nothing should tempt _him_ into writing a
memorandum, or, if possible, into allowing anybody else to do so. 'For
God's sake,' he said, 'don't let us begin minuting upon it; if the
matter must go to Empson, let us ask him to attend the Board, and have
it out once for all.' Now Mr. Empson was at this time Agent at
Dustypore. The custom was that he came to the Board only on very solemn
occasions, and only when the division of opinion was hopeless; then he
sat as Chairman and his casting-vote decided the fortunes of the day.
The next Board day, accordingly, Empson appeared, and it soon became
evident that Blunt was to have his vote.
Fotheringham was calm, passive, and behaved throughout with the air of a
man who thought it due to his colleagues to go patiently through with
the discussion, but whose mind was thoroughly made up. The fight soon
waxed vehement.
'Look,' said Blunt, 'at the case of cotton in the Kutchpurwanee
District.'
'Really,' said Fotheringham, 'I fail to see the analogy between cotton
and salt.' This was one of Fotheringham's stupid remarks, which
exasperated both Empson and Blunt and made them flash looks of
intelligence across the table at each other.
'Then,' Blunt said with emphasis, 'I'll explain the analogy. Cotton was
twopence-halfpenny per pound and hard to get at that. What did we do? We
laid out ten lakhs in irrigation, another five lakhs in roads, a vast
deal more in introducing European machinery and supervision; raised the
whole sum by an average rate on cotton cultivation--and what is the
result? Why, last year the outcome was more than double what it was
before, and the price a halfpenny a pound lower at least.'
'And what does that prove?' asked Fotheringham, who never could be made
to see anything that he chose not to see; 'As I said before, where is
the analogy?' Blunt gave a cough which meant that he was uttering
execrations internally, and took a large pinch of snuff. Fotheringham
looked round with the satisfied air of a man who had given a clencher to
his argument, and whose opponents could not with decency profess any
longer to be unconvinced.
'I am against it,' said Cockshaw, 'because I am against everything. We
are over-governing the country. The one thing that India wants is to be
let alone. We should take a leaf out of the books of our
predecessors--collect our revenue, as small an one as possible, shun all
changes like the devil--and let the people be.'
'That is out of the question,' said Empson, whom thirty years of
officialdom had still left an enthusiast at heart; '"Rest for India" is
the worst of all the false cries which beset and bewilder us; it means,
for one thing, a famine every ten years at least; and famines, you know,
mean death to them and insolvency to us.'
'Of course,' said Fotheringham, sententiously, with the grand air of
Æolus soothing the discordant winds; 'when Cockshaw said he was against
everything, he did not mean any indifference to the country. But we are
running up terrible bills; you know, Empson, we got an awful snubbing
from home about our deficit last year.'
'Well, but now about the Salt,' put in Blunt, whose task seemed to be to
keep everybody to the point in hand; 'this is no question of deficit. I
say it will pay, and the Government of India will lend us the money fast
enough if they can be made to think so too.'
'Well,' said Cockshaw, stubbornly lighting another cheroot, and getting
out his words between rapid puffs of smoke, 'it won't pay, you'll see,
and Government will think as I do.'
'Then,' replied Blunt, 'you will excuse me for saying Government will
think wrong, and you will have helped them. Have you examined the
figures?'
'Yes,' said Cockshaw, with provoking placidity, 'and I think them, like
all other statistics, completely fallacious. You have not been out here,
Blunt, as long as we have.'
'No; but the laws of arithmetic are the same, whether I am here or not.'
'Well,' observed Fotheringham, 'I really do not see--forgive me, pray,
for saying it--but, as senior member, I may perhaps be allowed the
observation--I really do not see how Blunt can pretend to know anything
about our Salt.'
'There is one thing I know about it,' said Blunt to Empson as they drove
home together from the Board; 'whatever it is, it is not Attic!'
While thus the battle raged within, Desvoeux, who had come with the
Agent to the Board, took an afternoon's holiday, and found himself, by
one of those lucky accidents with which Fortune favours every
flirtation, in Mrs. Vereker's drawing-room, where Maud had just arrived
to have luncheon and to spend the afternoon.
Now Mrs. Vereker was a beauty, and, as a beauty should, kept a little
court of her own in Dustypore, which in its own way was quite as
distinct an authority as the Salt Board or the Agency itself. Her claims
to sovereignty were considerable. She had the figure of a sylph, hair
golden and profuse and real. She had lovely, liquid, purple eyes, into
which whoever was rash enough to look was lost forthwith; and a
smile--but as to this the position of the present chronicler, as a
married man and the father of a family, renders it impossible for him to
describe it as it deserved. Suffice it to say that, even in a faded
photograph, it has occasioned the partner of his bosom the acutest
pangs, and it would be bad taste and inexpedient to say more than that
gentlemen considered it bewitching, while many married ladies condemned
it as an unmeaning simper of a very silly woman.
Mrs. Vereker affected to be greatly surprised at Desvoeux's arrival, and
even to hesitate about letting him in; but the slight constraint of her
manner, and the flush that tinged her cheek, suggested the suspicion
that the call was not altogether fortuitous.
'How provoking,' she said, when Desvoeux made his appearance, 'that you
should just come this morning to spoil our _tête-à-tête!_ Don't you
find, Miss Vernon, that whatever one does in life, there is invariably a
man _de trop?_'
'No,' cried Desvoeux gaily; 'Providence has kindly sent me to rescue you
both from a dull morning. Ladies have often told me that under such
circumstances it is quite a relief to have a man come in to break the
even flow of feminine gossip. Come, now, Miss Vernon, were you not
pleased to see my carriage come up the drive?'
'No, indeed,' said Maud; 'nothing could be more _mal à propos_. Mrs.
Vereker was just going to show me a lovely new Paris bonnet, and now,
you see, we must wait till you are gone!'
'Then, indeed, you would hate me,' answered Desvoeux; 'but happily there
is no necessity for that, as I happen to be a connoisseur in bonnets,
and Mrs. Vereker would not be quite happy in wearing one till I had
given my approval. She will go away now, you will see, and put it on for
us to look at.'
'Is not he conceited?' said Mrs. Vereker, raining the influence of a
bewitching smile upon her guests, and summoning, as she could at
pleasure, the most ingenuous of blushes to her cheeks; 'he thinks he is
quite a first-rate judge of everything.'
'Not of _everything_,' said the other, 'but of some things--Mrs.
Vereker's good looks, for instance--yes, from long and admiring
contemplation of the subject! It would be hard indeed if one could not
have an opinion about what has given one so much pleasure, and, alas! so
much suffering!'
Desvoeux said this with the most sentimental air, and Mrs. Vereker
seemed to take it quite as a matter of course.
'Poor fellow!' she said; 'well, perhaps I will show you the bonnet after
all, just to console you; am I not kind?'
'You know,' said Desvoeux, 'that you are dying to put it on. Pray defer
your and our delectation no longer!'
'Rude and disagreeable person!' cried the other, 'Suppose, Miss Vernon,
we go off and look at it by ourselves and have a good long chat, leaving
him alone here to cultivate politeness?'
'Yes,' cried Maud, 'let us. Here, Mr. Desvoeux, is a very interesting
report on something--Education--no, Irrigation--with nice tables and
plenty of figures. That will amuse you till we come back.'
'At any rate, don't turn a poor fellow out into such a hurricane as
this,' said Desvoeux, going to the window and looking into the garden,
where by this time a sand-storm was raging and all the atmosphere thick
and murky with great swirls of dust. 'I should spoil my complexion and
my gloves, and very likely be choked into the bargain.'
'But it was just as bad when you came, and you did not mind it.'
'Hope irradiated the horizon,' cried Desvoeux; 'but it was horrible. I
have a perfect horror of sand--like the people in "Alice," you know--
They wept like anything to see
Such quantities of sand.
"If this were only cleared away,"
They said, "it would be grand."
"If seven maids with seven mops
Swept it for half a year,
Do you suppose," the Walrus said,
"That they could get it clear?"
"I doubt it," said the Carpenter,
And shed a bitter tear.
And I shall shed a bitter tear if you send me away. At any rate, let me
stay to lunch, please, and have my horses sent round to the stable.'
'Shall we let him?' cried Mrs. Vereker teasingly. 'Well, if you do, you
will have nothing but poached eggs and bottled beer. There is a little
pudding, but only just big enough for Miss Vernon and me.'
'I will give him a bit of mine,' said Maud. 'I vote that we let him
stay, if he promises not to be impertinent.'
'And I will show him my bonnet,' cried the other, whose impatience to
display her new finery was rapidly making way. 'It is just as well to
see how things strike men, you know, and my _caro sposo_, among his
thousand virtues, happens to be a perfect ignoramus on the point of
dress. He knows and cares nothing about all my loveliest things.'
'Except,' said Desvoeux, 'how much they cost. Well, there is a practical
side which somebody must know about, I suppose, and a husband is just
the person; but it is highly inartistic.'
'How did you know that I was here?' Maud asked, when Mrs. Vereker had
left the room. 'And why are you not at the Agency doing your lessons?'
'Because we have an aviary of little birds at the Agency,' answered
Desvoeux, his manner instantly becoming several shades quieter and more
affectionate, 'and one of them came and sung me a tune this morning,
and told me to go and take a holiday and meet the person I like the best
in the world.'
'Now,' said Mrs. Vereker, gleefully re-entering the room, with a cluster
of lace and flowers artistically poised upon her shapely little head,
'is not that a duck, and don't I look adorable?'
'Quite a work of art,' cried Desvoeux, with enthusiasm. 'Siren! why,
already too dangerously fair, why deck yourself with fresh allurements
for the fascination of a broken-hearted world? I am convinced Saint
Simon Stylites would have come down from his pillar on the spot if he
could but have seen it!'
'And confessed himself a gone coon from a moral point of view,' laughed
Mrs. Vereker, despoiling herself of the work of art in question. 'And
now let us have some lunch; and mind, Mr. Desvoeux, you can only have a
very little, because, you see, we did not expect you.'
Afterwards, when it was time for Maud to go, it was discovered that no
carriage had arrived to take her home. 'What can I do?' she said, in
despair. 'Felicia will be waiting to take me to the Camp. George
promised to send back his office-carriage here the moment he got to the
Board.'
'Then,' said Desvoeux, with great presence of mind, 'he has obviously
forgotten it, and I will drive you home. Let me order my horses; they
are quite steady.'
Maud looked at Mrs. Vereker--she felt a burning wish to go, and needed
but the faintest encouragement. Felicia would, she knew, be not well
pleased; but then it was George's fault that she was unprovided for, and
it seemed hardly good-natured to reject so easy an escape from the
embarrassment which his carelessness had produced.
'I would come and sit in the back seat, to make it proper,' cried Mrs.
Vereker, 'but that I am afraid of the sun. I tell you what: I will
drive, and you can sit in the back seat, Mr. Desvoeux; that will do
capitally.'
'Thank you,' said Desvoeux, with the most melancholy attempt at
politeness and his face sinking to zero.
'Indeed, that is impossible!' cried Maud. 'I know you want to stay at
home. I will go with Mr. Desvoeux.' And go accordingly they did, and on
the way home Desvoeux became, as was but natural, increasingly
confidential. 'This is my carriage,' he explained, 'for driving married
ladies in: you see there is a seat behind--very far behind--and well
railed off, to put the husbands in and keep them in their proper
place--quite in the background. It is so disagreeable when they lean
over and try to join in the conversation; and people never know when
they are _de trop_.'
'Ah, but,' said Maud, 'I don't like driving with you alone. I hear you
are a very terrible person. People give you a very bad character.'
'I know,' answered her companion; 'girls are always jilting me and
treating me horribly badly, and then they say that it is all my fault. I
dare say they have been telling you about Miss Fotheringham's affair,
and making me out a monster; but it was she that was alone to blame.'
'Indeed,' said Maud, 'I heard that it made her very ill, and she had to
be sent to England, to be kept out of a consumption.'
'This was how it was,' said Desvoeux; 'I adored her--quite adored her; I
thought her an angel, and I think her one still, but with one defect--a
sort of frantic jealousy, quite a mania. Well, I had a friend--it
happened to be a lady--for whom I had all the feelings of a brother. We
had corresponded for years. I had sent her innumerable notes, letters,
flowers, presents, you know. I had a few things that she had given me--a
note or two, a glove, a flower, a photograph, perhaps--just the sort of
thing, you know, that one sends----'
'To one's brother,' put in Maud. 'Yes; I know exactly.'
'Yes,' said Desvoeux, in the most injured tone, 'and I used to lend her
my ponies, and, when she wanted me, to drive her. And what do you think
that Miss Fotheringham was cruel, wild enough to ask? To give back all
my little mementoes to write no more notes, have no more drives; in
fact, discard my oldest, dearest friend!--I told her, of course, that it
was impossible, impossible!' Desvoeux cried, getting quite excited over
his wrongs: '"Cruel girl," I said, "am I to seal my devotion to you by
an infidelity to the kindest, tenderest, sweetest of beings?" Thereupon
Miss Fotheringham became quite unreasonable, went into hysterics, sent
me back a most lovely locket which I had sent her only that morning; and
Fotheringham _père_ wrote me the most odious note, in his worst style,
declaring that I was trifling! Trifling, indeed! and to ask me to give
up my----'
'Your sister!' cried Maud; 'it was hard indeed! Well, here we are at
home. Let me jump down quick and go in and get my scolding.'
'And I,' said Desvoeux, 'will go to the Agency and get mine.'
Stolen waters are sweet, however; and it is to be feared that these two
young people enjoyed their _tête-à-tête_ none the less for the
consideration that their elders would have prevented it if they had had
the chance.