Dethronements
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Dethronements
Imaginary Portraits of Political
Characters, done in Dialogue
Laurence Housman
_Author of “Angels & Ministers”_
[Illustration: colophon]
Jonathan Cape
Eleven Gower Street, London
_First published 1922
All rights reserved_
Preface
The written dialogue, as interpretative of character, is but a form
of portraiture, no more personally identified with its subject than
drawing or painting; nor can it claim to have more verisimilitude
until it finds embodiment on the stage. Why then, in this country
at any rate, is its application to living persons only considered
legitimate when associated with caricature? So sponsored, in the
pages of _Punch_ and the composition of Mr. Max Beerbohm, it
has become an accepted convention too habitual for remark. Yet
caricature and verbal parody may be as critical both of personality
and character as dialogue more seriously designed, and may have as
important an influence not merely upon a public opinion, but upon its
moral judgment as well.
The defection of _Punch_ was felt by Gladstone to be a serious
set-back to the fortunes of his Home Rule policy; and Tenniel’s
cartoon of “the Grand old Janus,” saying “Quite right!” to the police
who were bludgeoning an English mob, and “Quite wrong!” to the police
who were bludgeoning an Irish one, was a personal jibe which hit him
hard.
The customary device, where contemporaries are concerned, of
disembowelling the victim’s name, and leaving it a skeleton of
consonants, is a formal concession which in effect concedes nothing.
Nor is there any reason why it should; for the only valid objection
to the medium of dialogue is in cases where its form might mislead
the reader into mistaking fiction for fact, and the author’s
invention for the _ipsissima verba_ of the characters he portrays. I
hope that this book will attract no readers so unintelligent. Having
chosen dialogue for these studies of historical events because I find
in it a natural and direct means to the interpretation of character,
my main scruple is satisfied when I have made it plain that they have
no more authenticity because they happen to be written in dramatic
form, than they would have were they written as political essays.
These are imaginary conversations which never actually took place;
and though I think they have a nearer relation to the minds of the
supposed speakers than have King’s speeches to the person who utters
them, they must merely be taken as a personal reading of characters
and events, tributes to men for all of whom I have, in one way or
another, a very great respect and admiration; and not least for the
one whom, with a reticence that is symbolical of the part he played
in the downfall of “The Man of Business,” I have here left nameless.
Contents
PAGE
THE KING-MAKER 13
(Brighton--October, 1891)
THE MAN OF BUSINESS 35
(Highbury--August, 1913)
THE INSTRUMENT 71
(Washington--March, 1921)
The King-maker
Note
Readers of this dialogue may need to be reminded, for clearer
understanding, of the following sequence of events. On November
15th, 1890, a _decree nisi_ was pronounced in the undefended divorce
suit O’Shea _v._ O’Shea and Parnell. On November 24th, Gladstone,
in a letter to John Morley, stated that Parnell’s retention of the
Irish leadership would be fatal to his own continued advocacy of
the Irish cause. In December, the majority of the Irish Party threw
over Parnell in order to placate the “Nonconformist conscience,”
and retain the co-operation of the Liberal Party under Gladstone’s
leadership. During the months following, Parnell and his adherents
suffered a series of defeats at by-elections in Ireland. In June
1891, immediately on the _decree nisi_ being made absolute, Parnell
married Katharine O’Shea. On October 6th he died.
Dramatis Personæ.
CHARLES STEWART PARNELL
(_Dethroned “King” of Ireland_).
KATHARINE PARNELL
(_His wife: divorced wife of
Captain O’Shea_).
A MAN (_Ex-valet to Captain O’Shea_).
A SERVANT.
The King-maker
_Brighton. October 1891._
_In a comfortably furnished sitting-room, with windows
looking upon the sea-parade, a Woman of distinguished
beauty sits reading beside the fire, so intently
occupied that she pays no heed to the entry of the
Servant, who unobtrusively lights the gas, draws down
the blinds, and closes the curtains. Then taking up
a tea-tray, served for two, she retires, and the
reader is left alone. But not for long. The slam of
the street-door causes an attention which the coming
and going of the Servant has failed to arouse; and
now, as the door opens, the brightened interest of
her face tells that, without seeing, she knows who is
there. Quietly, almost furtively, she lets fall the
paper she has been reading, and turns to her husband
eyes of serene welcome, meeting confidently the sharp
interrogation of his glance._
PARNELL. What are you doing?
KATHARINE. I was reading.
PARNELL. Yes? What?
KATHARINE. Those papers you just brought in.
PARNELL. And I told you not to.
KATHARINE (_smiling_). I was wilful and disobeyed.
PARNELL (_picking up the paper, and looking at it with contemptuous
disgust_). Why did you?
KATHARINE. Isn’t “wilful” a sufficient answer, my dear?
(_And with a covert look of amusement she watches him tear
and throw the paper into the fire._)
Why do you try to make me a coward? You aren’t one yourself.
PARNELL. That gutter-stuff! (_And the second paper joins its fellow
in the flames._)
KATHARINE. Now wasn’t that just a bit unnecessary? After all, they
are helping to make history. That is public opinion--the voice of the
people, you know.
PARNELL. Not _our_ people!
KATHARINE. Oh? Have you brought back any better news--from there?
PARNELL. Nothing special. The result of the election was out.
KATHARINE. You didn’t wire it. How much were we to the bad?
PARNELL. A few hundred. What does more or less matter? It’s--it’s the
priests who are winning now.
KATHARINE. With divided congregations as the result.
PARNELL. Yes. But I’d rather they won than the politicians. They are
honest, at any rate. Poor fools!
KATHARINE. So it’s the real country we are seeing now?
PARNELL. Yes. That’s the material I’ve had to work with!
KATHARINE. Wonderful--considering.
PARNELL. And now--now one gets to the root! But I always knew it.
KATHARINE. So you are not disappointed?
PARNELL. No; only defeated. Yet I did think once that I was going to
win.
KATHARINE. So you will.
PARNELL. When I’m dead, no doubt ... some day. You can’t fight for a
winning cause, and not know that.
KATHARINE. But you are not going to die yet, dearest.
PARNELL (_with a deep sigh of dejection_). Oh! Wifie, I’m so tired,
so tired!
KATHARINE. Well, who has a better right? Be tired, my dear! Give
yourself up to it: let everything else go, and just rest! You _are_
tired out. That’s what I’ve been telling you.
PARNELL. Too much to do yet. Even dying would take more time than I
can spare just now.
KATHARINE. But you must spare time to live, my dear--if you really
wish to.
PARNELL. Wish? I never wished it more--for now I _am_ living. I’m
awake. Doubts are over.
KATHARINE. King ... look at me! Don’t take your eyes away, till I’ve
done.... One of those papers said (what others have been saying) that
it was I ... I ... need I go on?
PARNELL (_with grim tenderness_). Till you’ve done: you said....
KATHARINE. I--that have ruined you.
PARNELL. That’s just what they would say, of course. It’s so easy:
and pleases--so many.
KATHARINE. All the same--by mere accident--mayn’t it be true? It
_has_ happened, you know, sometimes, that love and politics haven’t
quite gone together.
PARNELL. Love and politics never do. Do you think I’ve loved any of
my party-followers: that any of them have loved me?
KATHARINE. Doesn’t--O’Kelly?
PARNELL. He’s gone now--with the rest.
KATHARINE. Didn’t Mr. Biggar?
PARNELL. Dead.... No.
KATHARINE. Still, you love--Ireland.
PARNELL. Not as she is to-day--so narrow and jealous, so stupid, so
blind! Has she anything alive in her now worth saving? That Ireland
has got to die; and, though it doesn’t sound like it, this is the
death-rattle beginning. Ireland is going to fail, and deserves to
fail. But another Ireland won’t fail. She’s learning her lesson--or
_will_ learn it, in the grave. Something like this was bound to come;
but if it were to come again twenty years on, it wouldn’t count.
She’d know better.
KATHARINE. Twenty years! We shall be an old couple by then.
PARNELL. In the life of a nation twenty years is nothing. No. Ireland
was shaped for failure: she has it in her. It had got to come out.
Subjection, oppression, starvation, haven’t taught her enough: she
must face betrayal too, of the most mischievous kind--the betrayal of
well-meaning fools. After that, paralysis, loss of confidence, loss
of will, loss of faith--in false leaders. Then she’ll begin to learn.
KATHARINE. Do you mean that everything _has_ failed now?
PARNELL. Yes; if _I_ fail. I’m not thinking of myself as
indispensable: it’s the principle. That’s what I’ve been trying to
make them understand. But they won’t, they won’t! Independence,
defiance--they don’t see it as a principle, only as an expedient.
They may make it a cry, they may feel it as their right; but when to
insist on it looks like losing a point in the game--then they give
up the principle, to become parasites! That’s what is happening now.
It’s the slave in the blood coming out--the crisis of the disease.
That’s why I’m fighting it: and will, to the death! And when--when
we are dead--some day: she’ll come to her senses again--and see!
Then--this will have helped.
KATHARINE. But will it?
PARNELL. Why? Don’t you believe that Ireland will be free some day?
KATHARINE. I did when she chose you for her leader.
PARNELL (_bitterly_). A dead leader, one whom she can’t hurt, may do
better for her.
KATHARINE. Don’t say “dead”!
PARNELL. I shan’t be alive in twenty years, my dear. And it may take
all that.
KATHARINE. Without you it will take more.
PARNELL. It won’t be “without me.” That’s what I mean. They may
beat me to-day; but I shall still count. Think of all Ireland’s
failures! Grattan’s Parliament counts; “Ninety-eight” counts;
Fitzgerald counts; O’Connell counts; her famines, her emigrations,
her rebellions--all count.
KATHARINE. Does Butt count?
PARNELL. He wasn’t a failure: he didn’t try to do anything. If
Ireland needs more failures, to make a case for her conviction, shall
I grudge mine? Yes, all her failures count: they get into the blood!
Why, even the silly statues in her streets mean more than statues can
mean here. Prosperity forgets; adversity remembers. Even hatred has
its use: it grips, and drives men on.
KATHARINE. Did you need--hatred, to do that for you?
PARNELL. Yes: till I got love!... Reason, conviction aren’t enough.
Morley said a good thing the other day. The English, he said, meant
well by Ireland: but they didn’t mean it much.
KATHARINE. I suppose that’s true of some?
PARNELL. Quite true: and what is the most that it amounts to?
Compromise. Morley’s an authority on compromise. And yet I like him:
I get on with him. But he’s too thick with Gladstone to be honest
over this. Curious _his_ having to back the conventions, eh?
KATHARINE. Why does he?
PARNELL. Because the political salvation of his party and its leader
comes before Ireland. He means well by her: but he doesn’t mean it so
much as all that. Still he’s the only one of them who doesn’t pretend
to look on me as a black sheep. He too has to work with his material.
That’s politics. The Nonconformist conscience means votes--so it
decides him: just as the priests decide me.... They would decide him
in any case, I mean. And so--so it goes on.... “Look here upon this
picture, and on this”: Ireland trying to please England; England
trying, now and then, to please Ireland! I don’t know which is the
more ludicrous; but I know that both equally must fail. And they’ve
got to see it!--and some day they will. It won’t be “Home Rule”
then....
(_So for a while he sits and thinks, his hand in hers. Then
he resumes._)
My ruin? What would my ruin matter anyway? Put it, that the making
public of our claim--our right to each other--is to be allowed by
any possibility to affect the cause of a nation--the justice of that
cause: doesn’t that fact, if true, show that the whole basis of the
political principles they have so boasted, and on which we have so
blindly relied, was utterly and fantastically false and rotten?
Haven’t we, providentially, given the world the proof that it needed
of its own lie?
KATHARINE. We didn’t give it, my dear.
PARNELL. Well, their proof has satisfied them, anyhow: as they
are acting on it. Oh! When I see what poor, weak things nations
really are--so inadequately equipped for the shaping of their
own destinies--I wonder whether in truth the history we read
is not the wrong history--mere side history, to which a false
significance has been given, because so much blood and treasure
have been expended on it, which just a little expenditure of common
sense might have spared.... Think of all the silly accidents and
blunders, in Ireland’s great chapter of accidents, which have
counted for so much--even in these last few years!... The Phœnix
Park business--an assassination, for which perhaps only a dozen men
were responsible--and at once, for that one act, more suppression
and hatred and coercion are directed against a whole nation: Crimes
Acts, packed juries, judges without juries, arrests without charge,
imprisonments without trial. So logical, isn’t it? What a means for
putting a foreign Government right in the eyes of the people who deny
its moral authority!... And then--Pigott, that shallow fraud, driven
to suicide by those who were at first so eager to believe him: and
the exposure of his silly forgery turns elections, makes Home Rule
popular! Coming by such means, would it be worth it?... Gladstone,
honourably hoodwinking himself all those years, accepting you as
our secret go-between--and you making no pretence, my dear! Oh, I
suppose it was the right and gentlemanly thing for him to pretend
not to know. It was also, it seems, good politics. Chamberlain knew
too--must have known; for Chamberlain’s no fool; and yet to his
friend, the deceived husband, said nothing! It wasn’t politics; not
then. Now--now it’s the great stroke, and Home Rule goes down under
it.... Is that history, or is it “Alice in Wonderland”?... If you
are my ruin now, you were also my ruin then, when you were helping
me to think that I could win justice for a nation from politicians
like these: win it by any means except by beating them, bringing them
to their knees, making them red with the blood of a people always in
revolt, till their reputation stinks to the whole world! And when
they do at last climb down and accept the inevitable, then their main
thought will be only how to save their own face--and make it look a
little less like the defeat they know it to be!
KATHARINE. My dear, you are so tired. Do rest!
PARNELL. I _am_ resting: for now--thanks to you--I have got at the
truth! Political history is a thing made up of accidents; but not
so the fate of men or of nations whose will is set to be free. No
accident there! That you were tied to a man you wouldn’t live with,
who wouldn’t live with you--was an accident. But our love was no
accident; it was waiting for us before we knew anything. You and I
had each a star which shone at the other’s birth.
KATHARINE. Your star was mine, dearest. I hadn’t one of my own.
PARNELL. Well, if nations wish to be fooled, let them go to the devil
their own way, not laying the blame of their own folly on others! But
having got _you_--would I ever have let you go for any power under
Heaven? Why (as soon as you were free) did I marry you? I knew that,
politically, it was a blunder: that over there it would go against
us--prove the case. Half Ireland cared nothing for the verdict of an
English jury. But when we married, they had to believe it then....
Well, I wanted them to believe it. I know my love would have waited,
had I asked her. And it wasn’t--it wasn’t honour, my dear; it was
much more pride: for I am a proud man, that I own: and not less since
I have won you.
KATHARINE. If you hadn’t been proud, dearest, you would never have
got my love.
PARNELL. Oh, yes, I should. Those who love, don’t love for qualities
good or bad. They love them in the person they love--that’s all. You
have qualities which I didn’t care about till I found them in you.
To love is to see life--new!
KATHARINE. And whole. Some day--alone by ourselves--we will!
PARNELL. Don’t we already?
KATHARINE. Yes, if only--these other things didn’t interfere. But I
promised; so they must.
PARNELL. My dear, when they have quite broken me--they will in
time--then I’ll come.
KATHARINE. You promise to go right away?
PARNELL. I promise, sweetheart.
(_Moving toward each other they are about to embrace, when
the door opens, and the Servant enters carrying a card
upon a tray._)
SERVANT. If you please, sir.
(_Parnell takes the card; there is a pause while he looks
at the name._)
PARNELL. Will you say I am engaged.
(_The Servant goes. Parnell hands the card to his wife._)
I don’t know the man. Do you?
KATHARINE. No. And yet I seem to remember. Yes; Willie had a
man-servant of that name.
(_The Servant returns, bearing a folded note upon her
tray._)
SERVANT. If you please, sir, I was to give you this.
PARNELL (_having read the note_). Is the man still there?
SERVANT. Yes, sir.
(_There is a pause._)
PARNELL. Show him in.
(_As the Servant goes he hands the note to Katharine, and
watches while she reads it._)
So--you remember him?
KATHARINE. Only the name.... I may have seen him, now and then.
(_And then enters a smooth-shaven man, sprucely dressed,
with the irreproachable manners of a well-trained
servant. First, with a murmured apology, he bows to
the lady; then, having respectfully waited till the
silence becomes marked, says_:)
MAN. Good evening, sir.
PARNELL (_glancing again at the note_). You are a valet?
MAN. Yes, sir.
PARNELL. Are you wanting a place?
MAN. No, sir. I have a place.
PARNELL. Well?
MAN. That gentleman, sir--my last employer, dismissed me without a
character.
(_His reference is to the note which Parnell still holds
open in his hand._)
PARNELL. Well?
MAN. That’s all, sir.
PARNELL. Then what have you come here for?
MAN. To give you this, sir.
(_He draws out and presents a letter, rather soiled by
keeping, which has already been opened. There is a
pause, while Parnell looks first at the address, then
runs his eye over the contents._)
PARNELL. May I show it to--this lady?
MAN. Oh, yes, sir.
PARNELL. Whom, I take it, you recognise?
MAN. Yes, sir. (_And meeting her glance, he bows once more._)
(_Parnell hands over the letter, and while Katharine reads
there is a pause._)
PARNELL. Did you bring me this expecting money for it?
MAN. No, sir.
PARNELL. I see it has a date. You could have let me have it before?
MAN. Yes, sir.
PARNELL. More than--six months ago?
MAN. More than a year ago, sir.
PARNELL. Quite so. And you did not?
MAN (_eyeing him steadfastly_). No, sir. I was still comfortable in
his service then, sir.
PARNELL (_ironically, after a pause of scrutiny eye to eye_). I am
singularly obliged to you.... How did you come by it, may I ask?
MAN. Well, sir, he’d been dining out, sir. Left it in his
pocket--hadn’t posted it.
PARNELL. I see.... Had your dismissal anything to do with this?
MAN. Oh, no, sir. That only happened quite recently.
PARNELL. And then--he dismissed you without a character, you say? Do
you think you deserved one?
MAN. From him, sir?--yes, sir.
PARNELL (_coldly amused_). That is a good answer. Have you been put
to any expense coming here?
MAN. Just my return fare, sir.
PARNELL. And were you expecting me to----?
MAN. No, sir; I could have sent it in the post, if I’d wished.
PARNELL (_surprised_). Do you mean, then, that I may keep this letter?
MAN. Yes, sir.
PARNELL. I may do what I like with it?
MAN. Just what you like, sir.
PARNELL. Thank you.
(_After a pause of meditation he very deliberately tears
up the letter and puts in into the fire. Then, with
rather icy politeness_:)
I am much obliged to you; and I wish you a good evening.
(_A little crestfallen, but with quiet self-possession,
the man accepts the termination of the interview._)
MAN. Good evening, sir. (_He moves to the door._)
PARNELL. Stop!
(_The man turns as the other goes towards him, and they
meet face to face._)
You haven’t given yourself a very good character, coming here, my
man; but you might have done worse. Anyway, you’ve washed your hands
of it now. Don’t do things like that again.
MAN. No, sir.
(_And as he stands hesitating, Parnell opens the door._)
Thank you, sir.
(_The man goes. Parnell closes the door after him, comes
meditatively across, and sits down. There is a long
pause._)
KATHARINE. What are you--thinking?
PARNELL. A year ago!... If he had come to me with that a year
ago--what should I have done?
KATHARINE. You would have done just the same.
PARNELL. Torn it up? And put it in the fire?--I’m not so sure.
KATHARINE. But _I_ am. Hadn’t he the same right as I had, to live his
own life?
PARNELL. My dear, I said “a year ago.” That means before the case
came on. That would have stopped it--for good.... If I had had it--I
might have been tempted.
(_Watching him, she sees him smile._)
KATHARINE (_rather tremulously_). Are you glad--that you didn’t have
it?
PARNELL. And use it? Yes: I am--glad!
KATHARINE (_throwing herself into his arms_). Oh, my dear! Why, that
means everything. You’re glad! You’re glad!
PARNELL (_clasping her_). Oh, my own love, my own dear sweet!
KATHARINE. You regret--nothing?
PARNELL. Nothing. Haven’t I made you sure of that--yet?
KATHARINE. Oh, my King!--my King!
(_And just then the paper in the grate kindling into flame,
he points to it._)
PARNELL. Look! there goes--our proof.
KATHARINE. It doesn’t matter.
PARNELL. It never did.
KATHARINE. That’s what I mean.
PARNELL. But, politically, it might have made a world of difference.
KATHARINE. Yes--to the world; not to us. We wanted to be as we are,
didn’t we?
PARNELL. As we are, and as we were--how long is it?--eleven years
ago. There’s been no change since. When I go back to my star, I shall
have found what I came for. That’s what matters most. Souls either
find or lose themselves--live or die. I lived: I shouldn’t have done,
on this earth, but for you--but for you.
(_There is a pause. He sits meditating._)
KATHARINE. And of what--now?
PARNELL. The next generation--possibly the next but one: you and I
gone, and Ireland free. In this last year we may have done more for
that--than we could ever have planned. We’ve given them a bone to
bite on: and there’s meat on it--real meat. And because of that, they
call you my ruin, eh? I look rather like one, I suppose, just now.
But as I came home to-night, all my mind was filled with you; and I
knew that to me you were worth far more than all the rest. And then
suddenly I thought--what am I worth to you?
KATHARINE. This--that if now you told me to go--because it was for
your good--I’d go--glad--yes glad that you’d made me do for you, at
last, something that was hard to do--for the first time, dearest,
for the first time!
PARNELL (_deeply moved_). That so? Not an accident, then, eh?
KATHARINE (_embracing him_). Oh, my dear, my dear, my dear!
PARNELL. How true to life love makes everything!--so clear and
straight--looking back now. Through you I’ve learned this truth at
any rate--that there are two things about which a man must never
compromise--first his own soul, the right to be himself--no matter
what others may think or do.
KATHARINE. And the other?
PARNELL. His instinct, of trust or distrust, in the character of
others. I hadn’t any real doubt, but I compromised with instinct to
gain my end: did things I didn’t believe were any good--accepted the
word of men I didn’t trust. Home Rule itself was a compromise that I
made myself accept. But I never really believed in it. For you can’t
limit the liberty of a nation, if it’s really alive. Then came the
smash--that woke me. And that I was awake at last our love came to
be the proof.... Something different has got to be now. Ireland will
have to become more real--more herself, more of a rebel than ever she
has been yet. If, thirty years hence, my failure shall have helped to
bring that about--an Ireland really free--then I’ve won....
(_The words come quietly, confidently; but it is the voice
of an exhausted man, whose physical resources are
nearly at an end. For a long time he sits quite still,
holding his wife’s hand, saying nothing, for he has
nothing more to say. A high screen behind the couch
on which they rest cuts off the gaslight; only the
firelight plays fitfully upon the two faces. Suddenly
the brightness falls away, and over that foreshadowing
of death, now only three days distant, the scene
closes._)
The Man of Business
Dramatis Personæ
JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN
(_Ex-Minister_).
JESSE COLLINS (_His
Friend_).
A DISTINGUISHED
VISITOR.
A NURSE.
The Man of Business
SCENE: _Highbury. August 1913._
_Between double-doors, opening from living-room to
conservatory, sits the shadow of the once great and
powerful Minister, State Secretary for the Colonies.
To the dark, sombre tones of the heavily furnished
chamber the gorgeous colours of the orchids, hanging
in trails and festoons under their luminous dome of
glass, offer a vivid contrast. Yet even greater is
that which they present to the drawn and haggard
features of the catastrophically aged man whose public
career is now over. In wheeled chair, with lower limbs
wrapped in a shawl and supported by a foot-rest, he
sits bent and almost motionless; and when he moves
head or hand, it is head or hand only, and the motion
is slow, painful, and hesitating, as though mind
functioned on body with difficulty, uncertain of its
ground. Nevertheless, when the door opens, and the
small squat figure of a very old and dear friend
advances towards him, his face lights instantly. With
tender reverence and affection the newcomer takes hold
of his hand, lifts, presses it, lays it back again.
And when he has seated himself, the Shadow speaks._
CHAMBERLAIN. Well, Collins? Well?
JESSE COLLINS. Well, my dear Chamberlain, how are you? I’m a little
late, I’m afraid.
CHAMBERLAIN. I hadn’t noticed. Time doesn’t matter to me now.
JESSE COLLINS. No; but I like to be punctual. It’s my nature.
CHAMBERLAIN. Habit.... Habit and nature are different things,
Collins. I’ve been finding that out.
(_At this, for a diversion, Collins, readjusting his
pince-nez, tilts his head bird-like, and takes a
genial look at his friend._)
JESSE COLLINS. Joe, you are looking better to-day.
CHAMBERLAIN. Well, even looks are not to be despised, I suppose, when
one has nothing else left.
JESSE COLLINS. Come, come!
CHAMBERLAIN. Yes?
JESSE COLLINS. Nothing else left, indeed! Don’t--don’t be so _down_,
Chamberlain.
CHAMBERLAIN. Dear old friend!... Just now you called me “Joe.” You
don’t often do that. Why did you?
JESSE COLLINS. A reversion to old habits, I suppose. One does as one
gets older.
CHAMBERLAIN. Yes.
JESSE COLLINS (_genially making conversation, which he sees to be
advisable_). I was reading only the other day that, as we get on in
years and begin to forget other things, our childhood comes back to
us.
CHAMBERLAIN. Yes?
JESSE COLLINS. Now I wonder if that’s true?
CHAMBERLAIN. I wonder.
JESSE COLLINS. Mine hasn’t begun to come back to me.
CHAMBERLAIN. You aren’t old yet.
JESSE COLLINS. I’m over eighty.
CHAMBERLAIN. Good for another twenty years. And once you were my
senior. We weren’t quite boys together, Collins; but we’ve been good
friends.
JESSE COLLINS. Thank God for that!--Joe.
CHAMBERLAIN. Yes, I do. More now than I used to.
JESSE COLLINS. All the same, you haven’t so much cause to thank Him
as we have.
CHAMBERLAIN. No?
(_The listless monotone makes the little old man fear that
he is not succeeding._)
JESSE COLLINS. Is my talk tiring you?
CHAMBERLAIN. Not at all.... Please go on!
JESSE COLLINS. I only want to say what I said just now: Don’t be
down, dear friend. Your record will stand the test better than that
of others. Your work is still going on; it hasn’t finished just
because you are--laid up.
CHAMBERLAIN. “Laid up” is a kind way of putting it, Collins.
JESSE COLLINS. Why, I needn’t even have said that; when here--it’s
_sitting_ up I find you.
CHAMBERLAIN. Sitting _out_.
JESSE COLLINS. Well, “sitting out,” if you like, for the time being.
But do you imagine that this phrase or that phrase (true for the
moment) states the case, counts, is worth troubling about?
CHAMBERLAIN. Do I imagine? No, I don’t. I don’t imagine anything. I
was never a man of imagination.
JESSE COLLINS. You are, when you say that!
CHAMBERLAIN. No, Collins. When I’ve done anything, it has been
because I’ve had it in my hands to do.... My hands are empty now.
Some men manage to think with their heads only; others do it--with
their stomachs you might almost say. I’ve never been able to think
properly unless I had hold of things--had them here in my hands....
Look at them, now! (_With a slow, faint gesture he indicates their
helplessness; then continues_:) I was the man of business, ... and
now, I’m out of business; so I can’t think.
JESSE COLLINS. But that business, as you call it, Chamberlain, which
you made so many of us understand for the first time--I was a “Little
Englander” myself, once--that’s still going on.
CHAMBERLAIN (_bitterly_). Yes, it’s a fine business!
JESSE COLLINS (_startled_). Don’t you still believe in it?
CHAMBERLAIN. As a business? Yes. But it’s going to fail all the same.
There’s nobody to run it now.
JESSE COLLINS. We mean to run it, Chamberlain! You’ll see!
CHAMBERLAIN. I know you do, Collins. You are loyalty itself.
JESSE COLLINS. There are others too. I’m not the only one.
CHAMBERLAIN. You are the best of them.
JESSE COLLINS. No, I won’t admit that.
CHAMBERLAIN. Name?
JESSE COLLINS. The best? Probably some one we don’t yet even know.
The best are still to come. Time’s with us.
CHAMBERLAIN. Is it?
JESSE COLLINS. Don’t you think so yourself?
CHAMBERLAIN. Not now. I did once.
JESSE COLLINS. You always said so.
CHAMBERLAIN. I said it as long as I believed it: till the stars in
their courses turned against me. That broke me, Collins. If I could
have gone on having faith in myself, I shouldn’t be--as I am now.
JESSE COLLINS. But what--what made you lose it?
CHAMBERLAIN. Can’t you guess?
(_Collins shakes his head, remains valiantly incredulous;
and there is a pause._)
I saw somebody else--whose cards weren’t so good--playing with a
better hand. It was the hand beat me. My head’s all right still,
though it sleeps. But I’ve lost my hand. Look at it! (_Again the
gesture illustrative of defeat._) Threw it away. You know who I mean?
JESSE COLLINS (_cautiously, rather reluctantly_). I suppose I do.
CHAMBERLAIN (_watching to see the effect of his news_). He’s coming
to-day: to see me.
COLLINS (_surprised_). Coming here?
CHAMBERLAIN. Yes, it’s all been nicely arranged--just a call in
passing. To-morrow’s papers will describe it as “a pathetic meeting.”
Well, when a man has to meet his executioner on friendly terms, I
suppose it is “pathetic” for one of them.
(_All this is very disconcerting to poor Collins. He helps
himself to a half-sentence, and stops._)
JESSE COLLINS. Did he himself----?
CHAMBERLAIN. Propose it? Oh, yes--in the most charming way possible.
Isn’t it amazing how a man with charm can do things that nobody else
dare? I never managed to charm anybody.
JESSE COLLINS. You made friends--and kept them.
CHAMBERLAIN. So does he. He has been successful all round: art,
politics, letters, society--he has friends in all. I’ve only been
successful in business.
JESSE COLLINS. My dear friend, aren’t you forgetting yourself? You
came _out_ of business.
CHAMBERLAIN. No, I only changed to business on a larger
scale--carried it on under a bigger name. That’s how I found myself.
I had to make things into a business in order to make a success of
them. That was my method, Collins: glorify it as much as you like.
And up to a point it was good business, I don’t deny. That’s how
we ran local politics, invented the Caucus: Corporation Street is
the result. That’s how we managed to run Unionism: made a hard and
fast contract of it, and made them stick to it. That’s how I ran the
Colonies--and the Boer War. That’s how I was going to run the Empire
on a Preferential Tariff. That came just too late. I’d made a mistake.
JESSE COLLINS. What mistake?
CHAMBERLAIN. Collins, the Boer War wasn’t good business. It might
have been; but it lasted too long. Any modern war that isn’t over in
six months now is a blunder, you’ll find. They were able to hold out
too long. That did for me. There have been bees in my bonnet ever
since--all because of it. Boers first; then Bannerman; then--Balfour.
Just once my business instinct betrayed me, and I was done!
JESSE COLLINS. But--wasn’t the war necessary?
CHAMBERLAIN. To put the “business” on a sound footing? Yes, I
thought so; it looked like it. No, it wasn’t! But before I quite
knew, there’d come a point where we couldn’t go back; and so we just
had to go on--and on. D’you know what was the cleverest thing said
or done during that war?... You’d never guess ... but it’s true.
Campbell-Bannerman’s “methods of barbarism” speech. We downed him
for it at the time, but it caught on--it stuck. And it was on the
strength of it (with C.-B. as their hope for the future) that the
Boers were persuaded to make peace: saved our face for us. They might
have gone on, till we got sick of it, and the world too.
JESSE COLLINS. I don’t--I can’t think you are right, Chamberlain. You
are forgetting things.
CHAMBERLAIN. No--I’ve had difficulty about thinking so myself; but it
has come to me.
(_And so he sits and meditates over the point in his career
where as a business man he first failed. Presently he
resumes_:)
When two men, whose qualifications I used rather to despise, beat me
at business, Collins--it was a facer!
JESSE COLLINS. Bannerman; and--the other?
CHAMBERLAIN. Comes to see me to-day. But it won’t be a business
meeting. He’ll not say anything about it--if he can help.
JESSE COLLINS. And you?
CHAMBERLAIN. Perhaps I shall succumb to his charm. I’ve done so
before now.
JESSE COLLINS. Have you and he--had words ever?
CHAMBERLAIN. Differences of opinion, of course. “Words”? How should
we? He was always so wonderfully accommodating, so polite, so
apologetic even. Nobody ever had a finer contempt for his party than
he--not even old Dizzy, or Salisbury, or Churchill. So he could
always say the handsome thing to one--behind its back--even when he
was making burnt-offerings to its prejudices.
JESSE COLLINS. And when you left him?
CHAMBERLAIN. When I left him he did the thing beautifully. So
genuinely sorry to lose me; so sure of having me with him again,
before long. How could I have gone out and worked against him after
that? But it’s what--as a business politician--I ought to have done.
JESSE COLLINS. If you had--should we have won, straight away?
CHAMBERLAIN. We should have won the party, and the party-machine
too. For the rest it wouldn’t have mattered waiting a year or two.
Yes, we should have won. But here’s this, Collins: we should have won
then; we shan’t win now. Times are changing: the time for it is over.
Something else is coming along--what, I don’t know. My old fox-scent
has gone: wind’s against me. The Colonies are growing up too fast.
They won’t separate, but they mean to stand on their own feet all the
same: in their own way--not mine. We ought to have got them when they
were a bit younger: we could have done it then. Once it flattered
them to be called “Dominions”; now they are going to be “Sovereign
States.” And he--he doesn’t mind. He is never for big constructive
ideas--only for contrivances: takes things as they come, makes the
best of them--philosophically--and gets round them; and sometimes
does it brilliantly.
JESSE COLLINS. What will he talk about?
CHAMBERLAIN. Anything that comes into his head: the weather, the
garden, the greenhouses, the theatres. He’ll tell me, perhaps, of a
book or two that I ought to read, that he hasn’t had time for. He’ll
say, as you said, that I’m looking better than he expected. He’ll
say something handsome about Austen--quite genuinely meaning it.
Then he’ll say he’s afraid of tiring me; then he’ll go.... Have you
noticed how he shakes hands? He hasn’t much of a hand--not a real
hand--but he does it, like everything else, charmingly.
JESSE COLLINS (_a little crestfallen_). I thought you really liked
him.
CHAMBERLAIN. So I do. Because he has beaten me, is that any reason
for hating him? If it were--after a lifetime of polls and politics,
one would have to be at hate with half the world. No, from his point
of view he had to beat me, and he has done it. What I stick at is
that he has proved the better business man! As I used head and
hand--and heart (_and_ heart, Collins!)----
JESSE COLLINS. Yes, yes, I know you did.
CHAMBERLAIN. Some people thought I hadn’t a heart: “hard as nails”
they called me.... Well, as I used those, so he used his defeats, his
doubts, his indecision, his charm--and left his heart out. That was
the real business-stroke. That did for me.... I liked him: he knew
it. Whether he ever liked me, to this day, I don’t know--for certain.
If he did, it made no difference. That’s what I call business.
JESSE COLLINS (_warmly_). But you’ve always been honourable.
CHAMBERLAIN. So has he. Don’t be sentimental, Collins! But some
men manage in public life to give you a certain view of their
character: so that you count on it. And then, on occasion, they play
another--and get wonderful results. If I’d had that gift, I should
have used it and done better. He has used it, and he has done better.
I don’t whine about it. But I’d rather, Collins (I suppose I’m
prejudiced), I’d rather he hadn’t asked himself here--just now: not
just now.
(_There is a pause, and Collins feels that he must say
something; but finding nothing of any value to say, he
merely commentates with a query._)
JESSE COLLINS. What has “just now” to do with it?
CHAMBERLAIN. “Just now,” dear Collins, only means the next few months
or so--possibly a year. That’s all. I had rather he’d waited, and
then just sent a wreath with the right sort of inscription on it. He
could have done that charmingly too. And I haven’t got wreaths here
for _him_, for I don’t think that even a posy of these would really
interest him.
(_And with a weary gesture he points to the orchids, as
though they were things of which, not impossibly,
“posies” might be made._)
JESSE COLLINS (_a little perplexed by this introduction of wreaths
and flowers into political affairs_). What does really interest him?
He’s so interesting himself.
CHAMBERLAIN. You’ve hit it, Collins. It’s himself. Not selfishly. He
stands for so many things that he values--that he thinks good for the
world--necessary for the stability of the social order. He is their
embodiment: he is the most emblematic figure in the modern world that
I know--in this country, at any rate--representing so much that is
good in the great traditions which have got to go. And to stave off
that day he will do almost anything. He would even--if he thought it
would enable him the better to prick some of his bubbles--he would
even take office under Lloyd George.
(_At this point, unobtrusively, a Nurse enters and stands
waiting._)
JESSE COLLINS. I don’t think we shall live to see that!
CHAMBERLAIN. I shall not; you may.
JESSE COLLINS (_impulsively_). Chamberlain, I don’t want to live
after you!
CHAMBERLAIN (_cajolingly_). Oh, yes, you do! Anyway--I want you to.
You will send me a wreath that will be worth having.
(_Whereat his quaint little companion leans forward, and,
putting his two hands pleadingly on the swathed knees,
wants to speak but cannot. Slowly the sick man lets
down his own and covers them. And so, hand resting on
hand, he continues speaking_:)
Say what you like about the business man--the man who failed: he has
known how to make friends--good ones. And you, Jesse Collins, have
been one of the best: I couldn’t have had a better. There’s someone
been waiting behind you to give you a hint that you are tiring
me--staying too long. But you haven’t: you never have. Perhaps, in
the future, I shan’t see enough of you; perhaps, from now on, my
doctor will have to measure even my friends for me: three a day
before meals. But I shall get life in bits still--as long as you are
allowed to come.... Yes, Nurse, you may take him away now!
(_Jesse Collins rises, and stands by his friend with moist
eyes._)
JESSE COLLINS. Good-bye, my dear Joe, and--God bless you.
CHAMBERLAIN. Yes ... good-bye!
(_Hands press and part, and Jesse Collins tip-toes meekly
out, apologising for the length of his stay by the
softness of his going. Chamberlain’s head drops, his
face becomes more drawn, his hands more rigid and
helpless. Without a word, his Nurse arranges his
pillows, preparing him for the sleep to which his
unresisting body gradually succumbs._)
* * * * *
(_Two hours later he is awake again, and the Nurse is
removing a tray from which he has just taken some
nourishment. He lifts his head and looks at her. At
this sign that he is about to speak, she pauses.
Presently the words come._)
CHAMBERLAIN. Is he in there, waiting to see me?
NURSE. Yes, sir.
CHAMBERLAIN. Ask him to come in.
NURSE. You want to see him alone, sir?
(_There is a pause._)
CHAMBERLAIN. I think only one at a time is enough--better for me:
don’t you?
NURSE. It would be less tiring for you, sir.
CHAMBERLAIN. Yes. Ask him to come in.
(_So that being settled, she goes, and he sits waiting.
The afternoon sunlight is making the orchids look
more resplendently themselves than ever. So still, so
vivid, so alive, they hang their snake-like heads in
long pendulous clusters; and among them all there is
not a single one which shows the slightest sign of
falling-off or decay. Presently the door is softly
opened, and the Nurse, entering only to retire again,
ushers in the Distinguished Visitor, whose brow,
venerable with intellect, and grey with the approach
of age, crowns a figure still almost youthful in its
elasticity and grace, and perfect in the deliberate
ease and deportment of its entry into a situation
which many would find difficult. As he approaches the
wheeled chair, the kindness, modesty, and distinction
of his bearing prepare the way before him, and his
silence has already said the nicest of nice things, in
the nicest possible way, before he actually speaks.
This he does not do till he has already taken and held
the hand which the other has tried to offer._)
DISTINGUISHED VISITOR. My dear Chamberlain, how very good of you to
let me come?
CHAMBERLAIN. Not too much out of your way, I hope?
DIST. V. On the contrary, I could wish it were more, if that might
help to express my pleasure in seeing you again.
CHAMBERLAIN. Well, what there is of me, you see. You are looking well.
DIST. V. And you--much better than I expected.
CHAMBERLAIN. Did you expect anything?
DIST. V. I was told that you had bad days occasionally, and were
unable to see anybody. I hope I am fortunate, and that this is one of
your good ones?
CHAMBERLAIN. Well, as they’ve let you see me, I suppose so. I don’t
find much difference between my good and bad days. (Won’t you sit
down?) I’m still in the possession of my faculties; I sleep well, and
I don’t have pain.
DIST. V. (_seating himself_). And my staying with you for a little is
not going to tire you?
CHAMBERLAIN. It’s far more likely to tire you, I’m afraid.
DIST. V. No, indeed not! Apart from anything else it is a welcome
respite on the journey. Motoring bores me terribly.
CHAMBERLAIN. Then you had really meant coming this way, in any case?
DIST. V. I had been long intending to; and when, last week, Hewell
proposed itself, all fitted together perfectly.
CHAMBERLAIN. Are they having a house-party?
DIST. V. I think not: I trust not. No, I believe a hint was dropped
to them that it wasn’t to be--that I was feeling far too stale for
any such mental relaxation.
CHAMBERLAIN. Are you? You don’t look like it.
DIST. V. In politics one tries not to look like anything; but how at
the end of the session can one be otherwise?
CHAMBERLAIN. Is all going on there--as usual?
DIST. V. Yes ... yes. I don’t find being in opposition makes as much
difference as I expected, as regards work. One misses the permanent
official who always did it for one. Wonderful creatures--who first
invented them? Pitt, or was it Pepys? Oh, no, he was one of them. A
product, perhaps, of the seventeenth century.
CHAMBERLAIN. In Tudor times Prime Ministers were permanent, weren’t
they?
DIST. V. Their heads weren’t. Executions took the place of elections
in those days. And there’s something to be said for it.
CHAMBERLAIN. Yes. There was more dignity about it; it gave a
testimonial of character; the other doesn’t.
DIST. V. Still, electoral defeat is very refreshing. Rejection by
one’s own constituents is sometimes a blessing in disguise: it saves
one from undue familiarity.... That has never happened to you, has
it?
CHAMBERLAIN. It depends what one means by--constituents. In the
strict sense--no.
(_And now there is a pause, for something has been said
that is not merely conversation. Very charmingly, and
with a wonderful niceness of tone, the Distinguished
Visitor accepts the opening that has been given him._)
DIST. V. Chamberlain, I have been wanting to come and see you for a
long time.
CHAMBERLAIN. Thank you. So I--guessed.
DIST. V. I wrote to you--a letter which you did not answer. Perhaps
it did not seem to require an answer. But I hoped for one. So, after
not hearing, I made up my mind to come and see you.
CHAMBERLAIN. That was very kind of you.
DIST. V. No, it wasn’t; it was natural. We’ve worked together--so
long. And I wanted to assure myself that there was, personally--that
there is now--no cloud between us; no ill-feeling about anything. If
I thought that remotely possible, I should regret it more than I can
say. Speaking for myself----
CHAMBERLAIN. If you had not thought it possible--should you have come?
DIST. V. I cannot conceive how that would have made any difference.
CHAMBERLAIN. Still, if you had not thought it possible, you would
hardly have asked the question.
DIST. V. Well, now I have asked it. Speech is an overrated means
of communication--especially between friends; but it has to serve
sometimes. And you, at least, Chamberlain, have never used it
as--Talleyrand, was it not?--recommended that it should be used--for
concealment.
CHAMBERLAIN. So you think that--in words at any rate--I’ve been
honest?
DIST. V. I should say pre-eminently.
CHAMBERLAIN. And--loyal?
DIST. V. I have never had differences--political divergences--with
any man more loyal than you, Chamberlain.
CHAMBERLAIN. Thank you. I value that--from you. So the question’s
answered. On my side there is no cloud, as you tell me I have nothing
with which to reproach myself.
DIST. V. Thank you for the reassurance. In that case the heavens are
clear.
CHAMBERLAIN. I hope they are properly grateful. Such a
testimonial--from two men looking in opposite directions--is an
embracing one.
DIST. V. Opposite? Oh, I had hoped--though we may not see eye to eye
in everything--that still, in the main, we were in general agreement.
CHAMBERLAIN. Possibly. I daresay “a half-sheet of note-paper” might
still cover our “general agreement,” so long as we only talked
about it. That served us for--two years, did it not? But I wasn’t
meaning--as to our political opinions. I meant that you are still
looking to the future; I can only look back.
DIST. V. That, for you, must be a retrospect of deep satisfaction. It
has made much history.
CHAMBERLAIN. Catastrophes make history--sometimes.
DIST. V. You helped to avert them.
CHAMBERLAIN. Yes, for a time. But another may be coming, and I shan’t
be here then. And if I were, I should be no use.
DIST. V. Oh, don’t say that! Nor can I agree, either. No use? Your
good word is a power we still depend on. No, Chamberlain, we cannot
do without you.
CHAMBERLAIN. You did--when you accepted my resignation.