As the Mayor of Blackhampton watched from his window at the City Hall
the tall and striking form of John Endor merge itself in the welter
of citizens below in Market Square, he knew that he was faced by a
momentous issue. The case against the Government and the U. P., that
unholy alliance which had caused such widespread misery in the land
and which now was threatening once more the peace of the world, had
been urged with a force that had given the good man a shock. A key was
now his to many disconcerting events of recent years, and he could but
marvel that long before this he had not had the wit to discern the
truth for himself. The shameful graft of the new bureaucracy for which
Government by Newspaper had much to answer, he now saw from his own
experience, to be sapping the life and liberties of the State.
More than once of late at the Imperial Club, whose imposing freestone
façade stared at him from the other side of the Square, had Sir Munt
during the luncheon hour heard despondent businessmen declare “that
what the country really wanted to put things right was another war.”
During the late upheaval, whose scars had now begun to fade, all
classes of the community had shared in a delusive prosperity; but only
the few who controlled the means of production and their nominees in
Whitehall and Westminster had been permanently enriched. The price of
everything had been forced up, yet the value of everything had gone
down.
When Sir Munt entered the Club dining room at a quarter past one as
usual, he found it a hive. And it was a hive seething with excitement.
Political feeling ran high. This by-election, having regard to all the
circumstances, promised to be quite one of the most piquant of modern
times. John Endor whom the U. P. had returned by a solid majority
of four thousand at the last election, having bitten the hand that
fostered him, was now going ignominiously to be “fired.”
“Serve him right!” The opinion of the Club dining room was almost
unanimous. But that which none of these pundits could understand even
now was why in Wonder’s name had Slippery Sam offered John Endor the
Home Secretaryship? On the face of it such a move was an open and
palpable affront to the U. P. In the light of that circumstance only
one explanation was feasible. The prime minister was riding for a fall.
Even the most advanced thinkers at the Club luncheon table hesitated to
accept that view. Slippery Sam was the wiliest of men; yet those who
were ready to make every concession to his peculiar talent were quite
unable to read the riddle. If Endor was unseated, Mr. Williams would
have to appeal to the country. And what would happen then?
No, the pundits declared themselves beaten. It was left, however, to
the shrewdest and weightiest of them all to cast a ray of light upon
the darkness. Sir Munt, armed with the new and rather amazing knowledge
that had come to him less than an hour ago, proceeded to electrify the
table at the head of which he sat.
“Comes to this, Murrell, my boy.” Poising an oyster on an authoritative
fork Sir Munt turned augustly to Alderman Murrell, the eminent
Imperialist on his right. “Do we want another war or don’t we? That’s
what it comes to.”
A pause followed. And then, Sir Munt having enforced the appeal to
Alderman Murrell’s judgment by demonstratively swallowing the oyster,
the eminent Imperialist gave a cock of the head and said: “Well, Sir
Munt, since you ask me I say ‘Yes’ and I say ‘_No_.’”
“You can’t ride both horses, my boy.” Sir Munt poised oyster the
second. “You’ve got to make up your mind to one on ’em. If you want war
you’ll vote for this little Colonial Snot.”--Sensation!--“If you don’t
want war you’ll vote for John Endor.”
A pin might have been heard to fall on the Club mahogany.
“The time has come, Murrell, when some on us in this City has got to do
a bit o’ clear thinkin’. But before we can do anything we must have
the dust out of our eyes. What is the Universal Press up to?--that’s
the first question to ask ourselves. For years it has been preaching
Disarmament in one column and quoting Rudyard Kipling in the next. You
may be very bright and clever and quite well up in your business, but
oil and vitriol don’t always mix. Seems to me, Murrell, it’s time we
came to brass tacks.”
Alderman Murrell and his fellow Imperialists sat up now and took
notice. They had always been proud to think that Sir Munt whose force
of will and breadth of view they deeply admired was one of themselves.
He was very much one of themselves in point of fact. Was he not a
trustee of the Club and permanent chairman of its house committee? For
him to break loose in this unprecedented manner was indeed significant.
“I’ve just been having a heart-to-heart talk with Mr. Endor.” A swift
exchange of glances between the sconce-bearers of Sir Munt confirmed
them in the view that he undoubtedly had. “He says the long and short
o’ the matter is, the U. P. is trying to force the Government into a
war with China.”
Sensation!
“The prime minister is against it, but the Cabinet is in such fear of
what the U. P. can do at the next General Election that it means to
force his hand.”
“What can the U. P. do at the next General Election?” inquired a mild
voice on the left.
“Most people think,” said Sir Munt, “that the U. P. can put out the
present government as easily as it put it in.”
“But why should Saul Hartz want a war with China?” persisted the mild
voice.
“Labor is getting out of hand. And he thinks it may do good all
round--buck up trade, keep up prices, get the country and the colonies
to pull together, and so on.”
“There may be something in it.”
“I don’t think so, Jennings,” said Sir Munt. “We’ve got to look ahead.
If we get monkeying with China, the next thing on the tapis--so says
Mr. Endor, and he sees as far through a brick wall as most, does that
jockey--will be trouble between America and Japan.”
“Is that going to matter?” inquired a second Imperialist.
“We can’t afford to let Japan go under,” said Sir Munt sternly. “Our
commitments in that quarter are too deep.”
“A thousand pities, it seems to me,” interposed the slow dry voice
of the manager of the National Bank, “that America ever jacked up
the League of Nations. Seems to me that the world missed one of the
opportunities that can never recur.”
“Mr. Thorp, I’m with you there.” Sir Munt sighed heavily. “And she’s
thought so, too, more than once, I’ll bet a dollar. However, there it
is. And here’s the situation we’ve got to look at now. Every vote given
for the Colonial gentleman is a vote for the U. P. And to-day, says
Mr. Endor, and I for one can believe him, the U. P. means war with
China. And to-morrow it may mean war with somebody of more importance
than China.”
“Serve ’em right.”
The ill-timed remark from the other end of the table was drowned in a
chorus of stern dissent. Even to these ardent minds such a contingency
was not to be thought of. But on one point the great man at the table
head was emphatic. Until the U. P. was brought under control there
could be no security for any nation, any body of persons, any private
individual. And the moment being opportune, Sir Munt clinched his
argument with the story of the recent singular occurrence in that
city. Several of those who heard it, although not among the admirers
of John Endor--his views were much too “woolly” for thoroughgoing
Imperialists--had been present at the famous luncheon. These now bore
reluctant witness to the fact that he had been misreported. Not that
it particularly mattered. Speechifying didn’t cut much ice in these
times. And it was reasonable to allow every orator a certain amount of
latitude at a champagne luncheon.
“All very well,” growled Sir Munt. “But that speech has gone round the
world. His friends here, knowing the man and knowing the circumstances
in which the speech was made, are content to believe that some one has
blundered. I don’t put it higher than that. But at Hellington the next
day he got a broken head instead of a hearing.”
Honest Sir Munt, having made his point, subsided now in a brief period
of deglutition.
A few minutes later, in a favorite corner of the smoking room, he had a
little serious talk with Alderman Murrell.
“I don’t like voting Yellow,” the Imperialist confided in a rather
perplexed voice. “Somehow it goes against the grain, as it did against
that of my father before me, but if Mr. Endor can satisfy us that he
is not in favor of playing tricks with the Navy and the two-power
standard will be maintained, I’m not sure it isn’t my duty on this
occasion”--even in the sanctity of the Club precincts the worthy
alderman could not resist a rhetorical flourish--“on this occasion to
record my vote for the Clean, the Decent, the Aboveboard.”
Sir Munt looked in quite “an old-fashioned way” at his friend. “You
must be careful, Murrell, my boy,”--the grin of the great man was
almost saturnine--“you must be vur-ry careful how you interfere wi’ the
liberties o’ the Press.”