The Palliser Novels (442 page)

It was after that, but on the same day, that Lopez and Fletcher met each other in the street. The affair did not take a minute, and then they parted, each on his own way. In the course of that evening Mr. Sprugeon told his candidate that he, Sprugeon, could not concern himself any further in that election. He was very sorry for what had occurred; — very sorry indeed. It was no doubt a pity that the Duke had been so firm. “But,” — and Mr. Sprugeon shrugged his shoulders as he spoke, — “when a nobleman like the Duke chooses to have a way of his own, he must have it.” Mr. Sprugeon went on to declare that any further candidature would be waste of money, waste of time, and waste of energy, and then signified his intention of retiring, as far as this election went, into private life. When asked, he acknowledged that they who had been acting with him had come to the same resolve. Mr. Lopez had in fact come there as the Duke’s nominee, and as the Duke had no nominee, Mr. Lopez was in fact “nowhere.”

“I don’t suppose that any man was ever so treated before, since members were first returned to Parliament,” said Lopez.

“Well, sir; — yes, sir; it is a little hard. But, you see, sir, her Grace meant the best. Her Grace did mean the best, no doubt. It may be, sir, there was a little misunderstanding; — a little misunderstanding at the Castle, sir.” Then Mr. Sprugeon retired, and Lopez understood that he was to see nothing more of the ironmonger.

Of course there was nothing for him now but to retire; — to shake the dust off his feet and get out of Silverbridge as quickly as he could. But his friends had all deserted him and he did not know how to retire. He had paid £500, and he had a strong opinion that a portion at least of the money should be returned to him. He had a keen sense of ill-usage, and at the same time a feeling that he ought not to run out of the borough like a whipt dog, without showing his face to any one. But his strongest sensation at this moment was one of hatred against Arthur Fletcher. He was sure that Arthur Fletcher would be the new member. He did not put the least trust in Mr. Du Boung. He had taught himself really to think that Fletcher had insulted him by writing to his wife, and that a further insult had been offered to him by that meeting in the street. He had told his wife that he would ask Fletcher to give up the borough, and that he would make that request with a horsewhip in his hand. It was too late now to say anything of the borough, but it might not be too late for the horsewhip. He had a great desire to make good that threat as far as the horsewhip was concerned, — having an idea that he would thus lower Fletcher in his wife’s eyes. It was not that he was jealous, — not jealous according to the ordinary meaning of the word. His wife’s love to himself had been too recently given and too warmly maintained for such a feeling as that. But there was a rancorous hatred in his heart against the man, and a conviction that his wife at any rate esteemed the man whom he hated. And then would he not make his retreat from the borough with more honour if before he left he could horsewhip his successful antagonist? We, who know the feeling of Englishmen generally better than Mr. Lopez did, would say — certainly not. We would think that such an incident would by no means redound to the credit of Mr. Lopez. And he himself, probably, at cooler moments, would have seen the folly of such an idea. But anger about the borough had driven him mad, and now in his wretchedness the suggestion had for him a certain charm. The man had outraged all propriety by writing to his wife. Of course he would be justified in horsewhipping him. But there were difficulties. A man is not horsewhipped simply because you wish to horsewhip him.

In the evening, as he was sitting alone, he got a note from Mr. Sprugeon. “Mr. Sprugeon’s compliments. Doesn’t Mr. Lopez think an address to the electors should appear in to-morrow’s ‘Gazette,’ — very short and easy; — something like the following.” Then Mr. Sprugeon added a very “short and easy letter” to the electors of the borough of Silverbridge, in which Mr. Lopez was supposed to tell them that although his canvass promised to him every success, he felt that he owed it to the borough to retire, lest he should injure the borough by splitting the Liberal interest with their much respected fellow-townsman, Mr. Du Boung. In the course of the evening he did copy that letter, and sent it out to the newspaper office. He must retire, and it was better for him that he should retire after some recognised fashion. But he wrote another letter also, and sent it over to the opposition hotel. The other letter was as
follows: —
 

Sir
, —

Before this election began you were guilty of gross impertinence in writing a letter to my wife, — to her extreme annoyance and to my most justifiable anger. Any gentleman would think that the treatment you had already received at her hands would have served to save her from such insult, but there are men who will never take a lesson without a beating. And now, since you have been here, you have presumed to offer to shake hands with me in the street, though you ought to have known that I should not choose to meet you on friendly terms after what has taken place. I now write to tell you that I shall carry a horsewhip while I am here, and that if I meet you in the streets again before I leave the town I shall use it.

FERDINAND LOPEZ.

Mr. Arthur Fletcher.
 

This letter he sent at once to his enemy, and then sat late into the night thinking of his threat and of the manner in which he would follow it up. If he could only get one fair blow at Fletcher his purpose, he thought, would be achieved. In any matter of horsewhipping the truth hardly ever gets itself correctly known. The man who has given the first blow is generally supposed to have thrashed the other. What might follow, though it might be inconvenient, must be borne. The man had insulted him by writing to his wife, and the sympathies of the world, he thought, would be with him. To give him his due, it must be owned that he had no personal fear as to the encounter.

That night Arthur Fletcher had gone over to Greshamsbury, and on the following morning he returned with Mr. Gresham. “For heaven’s sake, look at that!” he said, handing the letter to his friend.

“Did you ever write to his wife?” asked Gresham, when he read it.

“Yes; — I did. All this is dreadful to me; — dreadful. Well; — you know how it used to be with me. I need not go into all that; need I?”

“Don’t say a word more than you think necessary.”

“When you asked me to stand for the place I had not heard that he thought of being a candidate. I wrote and told her so, and told her also that had I known it before I would not have come here.”

“I don’t quite see that,” said Gresham.

“Perhaps not; — perhaps I was a fool. But we needn’t go into that. At any rate there was no insult to him. I wrote in the simplest language.”

“Looking at it all round I think you had better not have written.”

“You wouldn’t say so if you saw the letter. I’m sure you wouldn’t. I had known her all my life. My brother is married to her cousin. Oh heavens! we had been all but engaged. I would have done anything for her. Was it not natural that I should tell her? As far as the language was concerned the letter was one to be read at Charing Cross.”

“He says that she was annoyed and insulted.”

“Impossible! It was a letter that any man might have written to any woman.”

“Well; — you have got to take care of yourself at any rate. What will you do?”

“What ought I to do?”

“Go to the police.” Mr. Gresham had himself once, when young, thrashed a man who had offended him and had then thought himself much aggrieved because the police had been called in. But that had been twenty years ago, and Mr. Gresham’s opinions had been matured and, perhaps, corrected by age.

“No; I won’t do that,” said Arthur Fletcher.

“That’s what you ought to do.”

“I couldn’t do that.”

“Then take no notice of the letter and carry a fairly big stick. It should be big enough to hurt him a good deal, but not to do him any serious damage.” At that moment an agent came in with news of the man’s retirement from the contest. “Has he left the town?” asked Gresham. No; — he had not left the town, nor had he been seen by any one that morning. “You had better let me go out and get the stick, before you show yourself,” said Gresham. And so the stick was selected.

As the two walked down the street together, almost the first thing they saw was Lopez standing at his hotel door with a cutting whip in his hand. He was at that moment quite alone, but on the opposite side of the street there was a policeman, — one of the borough constables, — very slowly making his way along the pavement. His movement, indeed, was so slow that any one watching him would have come to the conclusion that that particular part of the High Street had some attraction for him at that special moment. Alas, alas! How age will alter the spirit of a man! Twenty years since Frank Gresham would have thought any one to be a mean miscreant who would have interposed a policeman between him and his foe. But it is to be feared that while selecting that stick he had said a word which was causing the constable to loiter on the pavement!

But Gresham turned no eye to the policeman as he walked on with his friend, and Fletcher did not see the man. “What an ass he is!” said Fletcher, — as he got the handle of the stick well into his hand. Then Lopez advanced to them with his whip raised; but as he did so the policeman came across the street quickly, but very quietly, and stood right before him. The man was so thoroughly in the way of the aggrieved wretch that it was out of the question that he should touch Fletcher with his whip.

“Do you usually walk about attended by a policeman?” said Lopez, with all the scorn which he knew how to throw into his voice.

“I didn’t know that the man was here,” said Fletcher.

“You may tell that to the marines. All the borough shall know what a coward you are.” Then he turned round and addressed the street, but still under the shadow, as it were, of the policeman’s helmet. “This man who presumes to offer himself as a candidate to represent Silverbridge in Parliament has insulted my wife. And now, because he fears that I shall horsewhip him, he goes about the street under the care of a policeman.”

“This is intolerable,” said Fletcher, turning to his friend.

“Mr. Lopez,” said Gresham. “I am sorry to say that I must give you in charge; — unless you will undertake to leave the town without interfering further with Mr. Fletcher either by word or deed.”

“I will undertake nothing,” said Lopez. “The man has insulted my wife, and is a coward.”

About two o’clock on the afternoon of that day Mr. Lopez appeared before the Silverbridge bench of magistrates, and was there sworn to keep the peace to Mr. Fletcher for the next six months. After that he was allowed to leave the town, and was back in London, with his wife in Belgrave Mansions, to dinner that evening.

On the day but one after this the ballot was taken, and at eight o’clock on the evening of that day Arthur Fletcher was declared to be duly elected. But Mr. Du Boung ran him very hard.

The numbers were —

Mr. Du Boung’s friends during these two last days had not hesitated to make what use they could on behalf of their own candidate of the Lopez and Fletcher quarrel. If Mr. Fletcher had insulted the other man’s wife, surely he could not be a proper member for Silverbridge. And then the row was declared to have been altogether discreditable. Two strangers had come into this peaceful town and had absolutely quarrelled with sticks and whips in the street, calling each other opprobrious names. Would it not be better that they should elect their own respectable townsman? All this was nearly effective. But, in spite of all, Arthur Fletcher was at last returned.

Lopez, as he returned to town, recovered something of his senses, though he still fancied that Arthur Fletcher had done him a positive injury by writing to his wife. But something of that madness left him which had come from his deep sense of injury, both as to the letter and as to the borough, and he began to feel that he had been wrong about the horsewhip. He was very low in spirits on this return journey. The money which he had spent had been material to him, and the loss of it for the moment left him nearly bare. While he had had before his eyes the hope of being a member of Parliament he had been able to buoy himself up. The position itself would have gone very far with Sexty Parker, and would, he thought, have had some effect even with his father-in-law. But now he was returning a beaten man. Who is there that has not felt that fall from high hope to utter despair which comes from some single failure? As he thought of this he was conscious that his anger had led him into great imprudence at Silverbridge. He had not been circumspect, as it specially behoved a man to be surrounded by such difficulties as his. All his life he had been schooling his temper so as to keep it under control, — sometimes with great difficulty, but always with a consciousness that in his life everything might depend on it. Now he had, alas, allowed it to get the better of him. No doubt he had been insulted; — but, nevertheless, he had been wrong to speak of a horsewhip.

His one great object must now be to conciliate his father-in-law, and he had certainly increased his difficulty in doing this by his squabble down at Silverbridge. Of course the whole thing would be reported in the London papers, and of course the story would be told against him, as the respectabilities of the town had been opposed to him. But he knew himself to be clever, and he still hoped that he might overcome these difficulties. Then it occurred to him that in doing this he must take care to have his wife entirely on his side. He did not doubt her love; he did not in the least doubt her rectitude; — but there was the lamentable fact that she thought well of Arthur Fletcher. It might be that he had been a little too imperious with his wife. It suited his disposition to be imperious within his own household; — to be imperious out of it, if that were possible; — but he was conscious of having had a fall at Silverbridge, and he must for a while take in some sail.