The Palliser Novels: Complete Parliamentary Chronicles (All Six Novels in One Volume)
hard to discuss. He could not tell his wife that Fitzgerald ought to accept his bounty; but he assured her that his money should be forthcoming, almost to any extent, if it could be made available.
On the following morning he went down to the hotel, and saw the real landlord. He found him to be a reasonable, tranquil, and very goodnatured man,—who was possessed by a not irrational desire that his customers’ bills should be paid; but who seemed to be much less eager on the subject than are English landlords in general. His chief anxiety seemed to arise from the great difficulty of doing anything with the gentleman who was now lying in his bed upstairs. “Has he had any breakfast?” Mr Palliser asked.
“Breakfast! Oh yes;” and the landlord laughed. He had been very particular in the orders he had given. He had desired his cutlets to be dressed in a particular way,—with a great deal of cayenne pepper, and they had been so dressed. He had ordered a bottle of Sauterne; but the landlord had thought, or the head-waiter acting for him had thought, that a bottle of ordinary wine of the country would do as well. The bottle of ordinary wine of the country had just that moment been sent upstairs.
Then Mr Palliser sat down in the landlord’s little room, and had Burgo Fitzgerald’s bill brought to him. “I think I might venture to pay it,” said Mr Palliser.
“That was as monsieur pleased,” said the landlord, with something like a sparkle in his eye.
What was Mr Palliser to do? He did not know whether, in accordance with the rules of the world in which he lived, he ought to pay it, or ought to leave it; and certainly the landlord could not tell him. Then he thought of his wife. He could not go back to his wife without having done something; so, as a first measure, he paid the bill. The landlord’s eyes glittered, and he receipted it in the most becoming manner.
“Should he now send up the bottle of Sauterne?”—but to this Mr Palliser demurred.
“And to whom should the receipted bill be given?” Mr Palliser thought that the landlord had better keep it himself for a while.
“Perhaps there is some little difficulty?” suggested the landlord.
Mr Palliser acknowledged that there was a little difficulty. He knew that he must do something more. He could not simply pay the bill and go away. That would not satisfy his wife. He knew that he must do something more; but how was he to do it? So at last he let the landlord into his confidence. He did not tell the whole of Burgo’s past history. He did not tell that little episode in Burgo’s life which referred to Lady Glencora. But he did make the landlord understand that he was willing to administer money to Mr Fitzgerald, if only it could only be administered judiciously.
“You can’t keep him out of the gambling salon, you know, sir; that is, not if he has a franc in his pocket.” As to that the landlord was very confident.
It was at last arranged, that the landlord was to tell Burgo that his bill did not signify at present, and that the use of the hotel was to be at Burgo’s command for the next three months. At the end of that time he was to have notice to quit. No money was to be advanced to him;—but the landlord, even in this respect, had a discretion.
“When I get home, I will see what can be done with his relations there,” said Mr Palliser. Then he went home and told his wife.
“But he’ll have no clothes,” said Lady Glencora.
Mr Palliser said that the judicious landlord would manage that also; and in that way Lady Glencora was appeased,—appeased, till something final could be done for the young man, on Mr Palliser’s return home.
Poor Burgo! He must now be made to end his career as far as these pages are concerned. He soon found that something had been done for him at the hotel, and no doubt he must have made some guess near the truth. The discreet landlord told him nothing,—would tell him nothing; but that his bill did not signify as yet. Burgo, thinking about it, resolved to write about it in an indignant strain to Mr Palliser; but the letter did not get itself written. When in England, Mr Palliser saw Sir Cosmo Monk, and with many apologies, told him what he had done.
“I regret it,” said Sir Cosmo, in anger. “I regret it; not for the money’s sake, but I regret it.” The amount expended, was however repaid to Mr Palliser, and an arrangement was made for remitting a weekly sum of fifteen pounds to Burgo, through a member of the diplomatic corps, as long as he should remain at a certain small German town which was indicated, and in which there was no public gambling-table. Lady Glencora expressed herself satisfied for the present; but I must doubt whether poor Burgo lived long in comfort on the allowance made to him.
Here we must say farewell to Burgo Fitzgerald.
Chapter LXXVII.
The Travellers Return Home
Mr Palliser did not remain long in Baden after the payment of Burgo’s bill. Perhaps I shall not throw any undeserved discredit on his courage if I say that he was afraid to do so. What would he have said,—what would he have been able to say, if that young man had come to him demanding an explanation? So he hurried away to Strasbourg the same day, much to his wife’s satisfaction.
The journey home from thence was not marked by any incidents. Gradually Mr Palliser became a little more lenient to his wife and slightly less oppressive in his caution. If he still inquired about the springs of the carriages, he did so in silence, and he ceased to enjoin the necessity of a day’s rest after each day’s journey. By the time that they reached Dover he had become so used to his wife’s condition that he made but little fluttering as she walked out of the boat by that narrow gangway which is so contrived as to make an arrival there a serious inconvenience to a lady, and a nuisance even to a man. He was somewhat staggered when a big man, in the middle of the night, insisted on opening the little basket which his wife carried, and was uncomfortable when obliged to stop her on the plank while he gave up the tickets which he thought had been already surrendered; but he was becoming used to his position, and bore himself like a man.
During their journey home Mr Palliser had by no means kept his seat opposite to Lady Glencora with constancy. He had soon found that it was easier to talk to Mr Grey than to his wife, and, consequently, the two ladies had been much together, as had also the two gentlemen. What the ladies discussed may be imagined. One was about to become a wife and the other a mother, and that was to be their fate after each had made up her mind that no such lot was to be hers. It may, however, be presumed that for every one word that Alice spoke Lady Glencora spoke ten. The two men, throughout these days of close intimacy, were intent upon politics. Mr Palliser, who may be regarded as the fox who had lost his tail,—the tail being, in this instance, the comfort of domestic privacy,—was eager in recommending his new friend to cut off his tail also. “Your argument would be very well,” said he, “if men were to be contented to live for themselves only.”
“Your argument would be very well,” said the other, “if it were used to a man who felt that he could do good to others by going into public life. But it is wholly inefficacious if it recommends public life simply or chiefly because a man may gratify his own ambition by public services.”
“Of course there is personal gratification, and of course there is good done,” said Mr Palliser.
“Is,—or should be,” said Mr Grey.
“Exactly; and the two things must go together. The chief gratification comes from the feeling that you are of use.”
“But if you feel that you would not be of use?”
We need not follow the argument any further. We all know its nature, and what between two such men would be said on both sides. We all know that neither of them would put the matter altogether in a true light. Men never can do so in words, let the light within themselves be ever so clear. I do not think that any man yet ever had such a gift of words as to make them a perfect exponent of all the wisdom within him. But