HOW MEN IN OFFICE MAKE LOVE
‘Is it true they have captured Donogan?’ said Nina, coming hurriedly into
the library, where Walpole was busily engaged with his correspondence, and
sat before a table covered not only with official documents, but a number
of printed placards and handbills.
He looked up, surprised at her presence, and by the tone of familiarity in
her question, for which he was in no way prepared, and for a second or two
actually stared at without answering her.
‘Can’t you tell me? Are they correct in saying he has been caught?’ cried
she impatiently.
‘Very far from it. There are the police returns up to last night from
Meath, Kildare, and Dublin; and though he was seen at Naas, passed some
hours in Dublin, and actually attended a night meeting at Kells, all trace
of him has been since lost, and he has completely baffled us. By the
Viceroy’s orders, I am now doubling the reward for his apprehension, and
am prepared to offer a free pardon to any who shall give information about
him, who may not actually have committed a felony.’
‘Is he so very dangerous, then?’
‘Every man who is so daring is dangerous here. The people have a sort of
idolatry for reckless courage. It is not only that he has ventured to
come back to the country where his life is sacrificed to the law, but he
declares openly he is ready to offer himself as a representative for an
Irish county, and to test in his own person whether the English will have
the temerity to touch the man--the choice of the Irish people.’
‘He is bold,’ said she resolutely.
‘And I trust he will pay for his boldness! Our law-officers are prepared
to treat him as a felon, irrespective of all claim to his character as a
Member of Parliament.’
‘The danger will not deter him.’
‘You think so?’
‘I know it,’ was the calm reply.
‘Indeed,’ said he, bending a steady look at her. ‘What opportunities, might
I ask, have you had to form this same opinion?’
‘Are not the public papers full of him? Have we not an almost daily record
of his exploits? Do not your own rewards for his capture impart an almost
fabulous value to his life?’
‘His portrait, too, may lend some interest to his story,’ said he, with
a half-sneering smile. ‘They say this is very like him.’ And he handed a
photograph as he spoke.
‘This was done in New York,’ said she, turning to the back of the card, the
better to hide an emotion she could not entirely repress.
‘Yes, done by a brother Fenian, long since in our pay.’
‘How base all that sounds! how I detest such treachery!’
‘How deal with treason without it? Is it like him?’ asked he artlessly.
‘How should I know?’ said she, in a slightly hurried tone. ‘It is not like
the portrait in the _Illustrated News_.’
‘I wonder which is the more like,’ added he thoughtfully, ‘and I fervently
hope we shall soon know. There is not a man he confides in who has not
engaged to betray him.’
‘I trust you feel proud of your achievement.’
‘No, not proud, but very anxious for its success. The perils of this
country are too great for mere sensibilities. He who would extirpate a
terrible disease must not fear the knife.’
‘Not if he even kill the patient?’ asked she.
‘That might happen, and would be to be deplored,’ said he, in the same
unmoved tone. ‘But might I ask, whence has come all this interest for this
cause, and how have you learned so much sympathy with these people?’
‘I read the newspapers,’ said she dryly.
‘You must read those of only one colour, then,’ said he slyly; ‘or perhaps
it is the tone of comment you hear about you. Are your sentiments such as
you daily listen to from Lord Kilgobbin and his family?’
‘I don’t know that they are. I suspect I’m more of a rebel than he is; but
I’ll ask him if you wish it.’
‘On no account, I entreat you. It would compromise me seriously to hear
such a discussion even in jest. Remember who I am, mademoiselle, and the
office I hold.’
‘Your great frankness, Mr. Walpole, makes me sometimes forget both,’ said
she, with well-acted humility.
‘I wish it would do something more,’ said he eagerly. ‘I wish it would
inspire a little emulation, and make you deal as openly with _me_ as I long
to do with _you_.’
‘It might embarrass you very much, perhaps.’
‘As how?’ asked he, with a touch of tenderness in his voice.
For a second or two she made no answer, and then, faltering at each word,
she said, ‘What if some rebel leader--this man Donogan, for instance--drawn
towards you b some secret magic of trustfulness, moved by I know not what
need of your sympathy--for there is such a craving void now and then felt
in the heart--should tell you some secret thought of his nature--something
that he could utter alone to himself--would you bring yourself to use it
against him? Could you turn round and say, “I have your inmost soul in my
keeping. You are mine now--mine--mine?”’
‘Do I understand you aright?’ said he earnestly. ‘Is it just possible, even
possible, that you have that to confide to me which would show that you
regard me as a dear friend?’
‘Oh! Mr. Walpole,’ burst she out passionately, ‘do not by the greater power
of _your_ intellect seek the mastery over _mine_. Let the loneliness and
isolation of my life here rather appeal to you to pity than suggest the
thought of influencing and dominating me.’
‘Would that I might. What would I not give or do to have that power that
you speak of.’
‘Is this true?’ said she.
‘It is.’
‘Will you swear it?’
‘Most solemnly.’
She paused for a moment, and a slight tremor shook her mouth; but whether
the motion expressed a sentiment of acute pain or a movement of repressed
sarcasm, it was very difficult to determine.
‘What is it, then, that you would swear?’ asked she calmly and even coldly.
‘Swear that I have no hope so high, no ambition so great, as to win your
heart.’
‘Indeed! And that other heart that you have won--what is to become of it?’
‘Its owner has recalled it. In fact, it was never in _my_ keeping but as a
loan.’
‘How strange! At least, how strange to me this sounds. I, in my ignorance,
thought that people pledged their very lives in these bargains.’
‘So it ought to be, and so it would be, if this world were not a web of
petty interests and mean ambitions; and these, I grieve to say, will find
their way into hearts that should be the home of very different sentiments.
It was of this order was that compact with my cousin--for I will speak
openly to you, knowing it is her to whom you allude. We were to have been
married. It was an old engagement. Our friends--that is, I believe, the
way to call them--liked it. They thought it a good thing for each of us.
Indeed, making the dependants of a good family intermarry is an economy of
patronage--the same plank rescues two from drowning. I believe--that is, I
fear--we accepted all this in the same spirit. We were to love each other
as much as we could, and our relations were to do their best for us.’
‘And now it is all over?’
‘All--and for ever.’
‘How came this about?’
‘At first by a jealousy about _you_.’
‘A jealousy about _me_! You surely never dared--’ and here her voice
trembled with real passion, while her eyes flashed angrily.
‘No, no. I am guiltless in the matter. It was that cur Atlee made the
mischief. In a moment of weak trustfulness, I sent him over to Wales to
assist my uncle in his correspondence. He, of course, got to know
Lady Maude Bickerstaffe--by what arts he ingratiated himself into her
confidence, I cannot say. Indeed, I had trusted that the fellow’s vulgarity
would form an impassable barrier between them, and prevent all intimacy;
but, apparently, I was wrong. He seems to have been the companion of her
rides and drives, and under the pretext of doing some commissions for her
in the bazaars of Constantinople, he got to correspond with her. So artful
a fellow would well know what to make of such a privilege.’
‘And is he your successor now?’ asked she, with a look of almost
undisguised insolence.
‘Scarcely that,’ said he, with a supercilious smile. ‘I think, if you had
ever seen my cousin, you would scarcely have asked the question.’
‘But I have seen her. I saw her at the Odescalchi Palace at Rome. I
remember the stare she was pleased to bestow on me as she swept past me.
I remember more, her words as she asked, “Is this your Titian Girl I have
heard so much of?”’
‘And may hear more of,’ muttered he, almost unconsciously.
‘Yes--even that too; but not, perhaps, in the sense you mean.’ Then, as if
correcting herself, she went on, ‘It was a bold ambition of Mr. Atlee. I
must say I like the very daring of it.’
‘_He_ never dared it--take my word for it.’
An insolent laugh was her first reply. ‘How little you men know of each
other, and how less than little you know of us! You sneer at the people who
are moved by sudden impulse, but you forget it is the squall upsets the
boat.’
‘I believe I can follow what you mean. You would imply that my cousin’s
breach with _me_ might have impelled her to listen to Atlee?’
‘Not so much that as, by establishing himself as her confidant, he got the
key of her heart, and let himself in as he pleased.’
‘I suspect he found little to interest him there.’
‘The insufferable insolence of that speech! Can you men never be brought to
see that we are not all alike to each of you; that our natures have their
separate watchwords, and that the soul which would vibrate with tenderness
to this, is to that a dead and senseless thing, with no trace or touch of
feeling about it?’
‘I only believe this in part.’
‘Believe it wholly, then, or own that you know nothing of love--no more
than do those countless thousands who go through life and never taste its
real ecstasy, nor its real sorrow; who accept convenience, or caprice, or
flattered vanity as its counterfeit, and live out the delusion in lives of
discontent. You have done wrong to break with your cousin. It is clear to
me you suited each other.’
‘This is sarcasm.’
‘If it is, I am sorry for it. I meant it for sincerity. In _your_ career,
ambition is everything. The woman that could aid you on your road would be
the real helpmate. She who would simply cross your path by her sympathies,
or her affections, would be a mere embarrassment. Take the very case before
us. Would not Lady Maude point out to you how, by the capture of this
rebel, you might so aid your friends as to establish a claim for
recompense? Would she not impress you with the necessity of showing how
your activity redounded to the credit of your party? She would neither
interpose with ill-timed appeals to your pity or a misplaced sympathy.
_She_ would help the politician, while another might hamper the man.’
‘All that might be true, if the game of political life were played as it
seems to be on the surface, and my cousin was exactly the sort of woman to
use ordinary faculties with ability and acuteness; but there are scores of
things in which her interference would have been hurtful, and her secrecy
dubious. I will give you an instance, and it will serve to show my implicit
confidence in yourself. Now with respect to this man, Donogan, there is
nothing we wish less than to take him. To capture means to try--to try
means to hang him--and how much better, or safer, or stronger are we when
it is done? These fellows, right or wrong, represent opinions that are
never controverted by the scaffold, and every man who dies for his
convictions leaves a thousand disciples who never believed in him before.
It is only because he braves us that we pursue him, and in the face of our
opponents and Parliament we cannot do less. So that while we are offering
large rewards for his apprehension, we would willingly give double the sum
to know he had escaped. Talk of the supremacy of the Law--the more you
assert that here, the more ungovernable is this country by a Party. An
active Attorney-General is another word for three more regiments in
Ireland.’
‘I follow you with some difficulty; but I see that you would like this man
to get away, and how is that to be done?’
‘Easily enough, when once he knows that it will be safe for him to go
north. He naturally fears the Orangemen of the northern counties. They
will, however, do nothing without the police, and the police have got their
orders throughout Antrim and Derry. Here--on this strip of paper--here are
the secret instructions:--“To George Dargan, Chief Constable, Letterkenny
District. Private and confidential.--It is, for many reasons, expedient
that the convict Donogan, on a proper understanding that he will not return
to Ireland, should be suffered to escape. If you are, therefore, in a
position to extort a pledge from him to this extent--and it should be
explicit and beyond all cavil--you will, taking due care not to compromise
your authority in your office, aid him to leave the country, even to the
extent of moneyed assistance.” To this are appended directions how he is to
proceed to carry out these instructions: what he may, and what he may not
do, with whom he may seek for co-operation, and where he is to maintain a
guarded and careful secrecy. Now, in telling you all this, Mademoiselle
Kostalergi, I have given you the strongest assurance in my power of the
unlimited trust I have in you. I see how the questions that agitate this
country interest you. I read the eagerness with which you watch them, but
I want you to see more. I want you to see that the men who purpose to
themselves the great task of extricating Ireland from her difficulties must
be politicians in the highest sense of the word, and that you should see
in us statesmen of an order that can weigh human passions and human
emotions--and see that hope and fear, and terror and gratitude, sway the
hearts of men who, to less observant eyes, seem to have no place in their
natures but for rebellion. That this mode of governing Ireland is the one
charm to the Celtic heart, all the Tory rule of the last fifty years,
with its hangings and banishments and other terrible blunders, will soon
convince you. The Priest alone has felt the pulse of this people, and
we are the only Ministers of England who have taken the Priest into our
confidence. I own to you I claim some credit for myself in this discovery.
It was in long reflecting over the ills of Ireland that I came to see
that where the malady has so much in its nature that is sensational and
emotional, so must the remedy be sensational too. The Tories were ever bent
on extirpating--_we_ devote ourselves to “healing measures.” Do you follow
me?’
‘I do,’ said she thoughtfully.
‘Do I interest you?’ asked he, more tenderly.
‘Intensely,’ was the reply.
‘Oh, if I could but think _that_. If I could bring myself to believe that
the day would come, not only to secure your interest, but your aid and your
assistance in this great task! I have long sought the opportunity to tell
you that we, who hold the destinies of a people in our keeping, are not
inferior to our great trust, that we are not mere creatures of a state
department, small deities of the Olympus of office, but actual statesmen
and rulers. Fortune has given me the wished-for moment, let it complete
my happiness, let it tell me that you see in this noble work one worthy
of your genius and your generosity, and that you would accept me as a
fellow-labourer in the cause.’
The fervour which he threw into the utterance of these words contrasted
strongly and strangely with the words themselves; so unlike the declaration
of a lover’s passion.
‘I do--not--know,’ said she falteringly.
‘What is that you do not know?’ asked he, with tender eagerness.
‘I do not know if I understand you aright, and I do not know what answer I
should give you.’
‘Will not your heart tell you?’
She shook her head.
‘You will not crush me with the thought that there is no pleading for me
there.’
‘If you had desired in honesty my regard, you should not have prejudiced
me: you began here by enlisting my sympathies in your Task; you told me of
your ambitions. I like these ambitions.’
‘Why not share them?’ cried he passionately.
‘You seem to forget what you ask. A woman does not give her heart as a
man joins a party or an administration. It is no question of an advantage
based upon a compromise. There is no sentiment of gratitude, or recompense,
or reward in the gift. She simply gives that which is no longer hers to
retain! She trusts to what her mind will not stop to question--she goes
where she cannot help but follow.’
‘How immeasurably greater your every word makes the prize of your love.’
‘It is in no vanity that I say I know it,’ said she calmly. ‘Let us speak
no more on this now.’
‘But you will not refuse to listen to me, Nina?’
‘I will read you if you write to me,’ and with a wave of good-bye she
slowly left the room.
‘She is my master, even at my own game,’ said Walpole, as he sat down, and
rested his head between his hands. ‘Still she is mistaken: I can write just
as vaguely as I can speak, and if I could not, it would have cost me my
freedom this many a day. With such a woman one might venture high, but
Heaven help him when he ceased to climb the mountain!’