The Title by Arnold Bennett (books to read in a lifetime TXT) 📕

as prehistoric; and yet you are so behind the times as to imagine that the first duty of modern Governments is to govern! My dear Rip van Winkle, wake up. The first duty of a Government is to live. It has no right to be a Government at all unless it is convinced that if it fell the country would go to everlasting smash. Hence its first duty is to survive. In order to survive it must do three things--placate certain interests, influence votes, and obtain secret funds. All these three things can be accomplished by the ingenious institution of Honours. Only the simple-minded believe that Honours are given to honour. Honours are given to save the life of the Government. Hence the Honours List. Examine the Honours List and you can instantly tell how the Government feels in its inside. When the Honours List is full of rascals, millionaires, and--er--chumps, you may be quite sure that the Government is dangerously ill.

TRANTO. But that amounts to what we've been saying in The Echo to-day.

CULVER. Yes, I've read the The Echo.

JOHN. I thought you never had a free moment at the office--always rushed to death--at least that's the mater's theory.

CULVER. I've read The Echo, and my one surprise is that you're here to-night, Tranto.

TRANTO. Why?

CULVER. I quite thought you'd have been shoved into the Tower under the Defence of the Realm Act. Or Sampson Straight, anyway. (Hildegarde starts.) Your contributor has committed the unpardonable sin of hitting the nail on the head. He might almost have seen an advance copy of the Honours List.

TRANTO. He hadn't. Nor had I. Who's in it?

CULVER. You might ask who isn't in it. (Taking a paper from his pocket.) Well, Gentletie's in it. He gets a knighthood.

TRANTO. Never heard of him. Who is he?

HILDEGARDE. Oh, yes, you've heard of him. (John glances at her severely.) He's M.P. for some earthly paradise or other in the South Riding.

TRANTO. Oh!

CULVER. Perhaps I might read you something written by my private secretary--he's one of these literary wags. You see there's been a demand that the Government should state clearly, in every case of an Honour, exactly what services the Honour is given for. This (taking paper from his pocket) is supposed to be the stuff sent round to the Press by the Press Bureau. (Reads.) 'Mr. Gentletie has gradually made a solid reputation for himself as the dullest man in the House of Commons. Whenever he rises to his feet the House empties as if by magic. In cases of inconvenience, when the Government wishes abruptly to close a debate by counting out the House, it has invariably put up Mr. Gentletie to speak. The device has never been known to fail. Nobody can doubt that Mr. Gentletie's patriotic devotion to the Allied cause well merits the knighthood which is now bestowed on him.'

JOHN (astounded.) Stay me with flagons!

TRANTO. So that's that! And who else?

CULVER. Another of your esteemed uncles.

TRANTO. Well, that's not very startling, seeing that my uncle's chief daily organ is really a department of the Government.

JOHN. What I say is--

HILDEGARDE (simultaneously with John). Wouldn't it be more correct--(continuing alone) wouldn't it be more correct to say that the Government is really a department of your uncle's chief daily organ?

JOHN. Hilda, old girl, I wish you wouldn't interrupt. Cookery's your line.

HILDEGARDE. Sorry, Johnnie. I see I was in danger of becoming unsexed.

CULVER (to John). Yes? You were about to say?

JOHN. Oh, nothing.

CULVER (to Tranto). Shall I read the passage on your uncle?

TRANTO. Don't trouble. Who's the next?

CULVER. The next is--Ullivant, munitions manufacturer. Let me see. (Reads.) By the simple means of saying that the cost price of shells was eighteen shillings and ninepence each, whereas it was in fact only ten shillings and ninepence, Mr. Joshua Ullivant has made a fortune of two million pounds during the war. He has given a hundred thousand to the Prince of Wales's Fund, a hundred thousand to the Red Cross, and a hundred thousand to the party funds. Total net profit on the war, one million seven hundred thousand pounds, not counting the peerage which is now bestowed upon him, and which it must be admitted is a just reward for his remarkable business acumen.'

TRANTO. Very agreeable fellow Ullivant is, nevertheless.

CULVER. Oh, he is. They're most of them too damned agreeable for anything. Another prominent name is Orlando Bush.

TRANTO. Ah!

MRS. CULVER. I've met his wife. She dances beautifully at charity matinees.

CULVER. No doubt. But apparently that's not the reason.

TRANTO. I know Orlando. I've just bought the serial rights of his book.

CULVER. Have you paid him?

TRANTO. No.

CULVER. How wise of you! (Reads). 'Mr. Orlando Bush has written a historical sketch, with many circumstantial details, of the political origins of the present Government. For his forbearance in kindly consenting to withold publication until the end of the war Mr. Bush receives a well-earned'--

TRANTO. What?

CULVER. Knighthood.

TRANTO. Cheap! But what a sell for me!

CULVER. Now, ladies and gentlemen, the last name with which I will trouble you is that of Mr. James Brill.

TRANTO. Not Jimmy Brill!

CULVER. Jimmy Brill.

TRANTO. But he's a--

CULVER. Stop, my dear Tranto. No crude phrases, please. (Reads.) 'Mr. James Brill, to use the language of metaphor, possessed a pistol, which pistol he held point blank at the head of the Government. The Government has thought it wise to purchase Mr. James Brill's pistol--'

TRANTO. But he's a--

CULVER (raising a hand). He is merely the man with the pistol, and in exchange for the pistol he gets a baronetcy.

TRANTO. A baronetcy!

CULVER. His title and pistol will go rattling down the ages, my dear Tranto, from generation to generation. For the moment the fellow's name stinks, but only for the moment. In the nostrils of his grandson (third baronet), it will have a most sweet odour.

MRS. CULVER. But all this is perfectly shocking.

CULVER. Now I hope you comprehend my emotion, darling.

MRS. CULVER But surely there are some nice names on the List.

CULVER. Of course. There have to be some nice names, for the sake of the psychological effect on the public mind on New Year's Day. The public looks for a good name, or for a name it can understand. It skims down the List till it sees one. Then it says: 'Ah! That's not so bad!' Then it skims down further till it sees another one, and it says again: 'Ah! That's not so bad!' And so on. So that with about five or six decent names you can produce the illusion that after all the List is really rather good.

HILDEGARDE. The strange thing to me is that decent people condescend to receive titles at all.

MRS. CULVER. Bravo, Hildegarde! Yes, if it's so bad as you make out, Arthur, why do decent people take Honours?

CULVER. I'll tell you. Decent people have wives, and their wives lead them by the nose. That's why decent people take Honours.

MRS. CULVER. Well, I think it's monstrous!

CULVER. So it is. I've been a Conservative all my life; I am a Conservative. I swear I am. And yet, now when I look back, I'm amazed at the things I used to do. Why, once I actually voted against a candidate who stood for the reform of the House of Lords. Seems incredible. This war is changing my ideas. (Suddenly, after a slight pause.) I'm dashed if I don't join the Labour party and ask Ramsay Macdonald to lunch.

Enter Parlourmaid, back.

PARLOURMAID. You are wanted on the telephone, madam.

MRS. CULVER. Oh, Arthur! (Pats him on the shoulder as she goes out.)

(Exit Mrs. Culver and Parlourmaid, back.)

CULVER. Hildegarde, go and see if you can hurry up dinner.

HILDEGARDE. No one could.

CULVER. Never mind, go and see. (Exit Hildegarde, back.) John, just take these keys, and get some cigars out of the cabinet, you know, Partagas.

JOHN. Oh! Is it a Partaga night? (Exit, back.)

CULVER (watching the door close). Tranto, we are conspirators.

TRANTO. You and I?

CULVER. Yes. But we must have no secrets. Who wrote that article in The Echo? Who is Sampson Straight?

TRANTO (temporising, lightly). You remind me of the man with the pistol.

CULVER. Is it Hildegarde?

TRANTO. How did you guess?

CULVER. Well; first, I knew my daughter couldn't be the piffling lunatic who does your war cookery articles. Second, I asked myself: What reason has she for pretending to be that piffling lunatic? Third, I have an exceedingly high opinion of my daughter's brains. Fourth, she gave a funny start just now when I mentioned the idea of Sampson Straight going to the Tower.

TRANTO. Perhaps I ought to explain--

CULVER. No you oughn't. There's no time. I simply wanted a bit of information. I've got it. Now I have a bit of information for you. I've been offered a place in this beautiful Honours List. Baronetcy! Me! I am put on the same high plane as Mr. James Brill, the unspeakable. The formal offer hasn't actually arrived--it's late; I expect the letter'll be here in the morning--but I know for a fact I'm in the List for a baronetcy.

TRANTO. Well, I congratulate you.

CULVER. You'd better not.

TRANTO. You deserve more than a baronetcy. Your department has been a striking success--one of the very few in the whole length of Whitehall.

CULVER. I know my department has been a success. But that's not why I'm offered a baronetcy. Good heavens, I haven't even spoken to any member of the War Cabinet yet. I've been trying to for about a year, but in spite of powerful influences to help me I've never been able to bring off a meeting with the mandarins. No! I'm offered a baronetcy because I'm respectable; I'm decent; and at the last moment they thought the List looked a bit too thick--so they pushed me in. One of their brilliant afterthoughts!... No damned merit about the thing, I can tell you!

TRANTO. Do you mean you intend to refuse?

CULVER. Do you mean you ever imagined that I should accept? Me, in the same galley with Brill--who daren't go into his own clubs--and Ullivant, and a few more pretty nearly as bad! Of course, I shall refuse. Nothing on earth would induce me to accept. Nothing! (More calmly.) Mind you, I don't blame the Government; probably the Government can't help itself. Therefore the Government must be helped; and sometimes the best way to help a fellow creature is to bring him to his senses by catching him one across the jaw.

TRANTO. Why are you making a secret of it? The offer is surely bound to come out.

CULVER. Of course. I'm only making a secret of it for the moment, while I prepare the domestic ground for my refusal.

TRANTO. You wish me to understand--

CULVER. You know what women are. (With caution.) I speak of the sex in general.

TRANTO. I see.

CULVER. That's all right.

TRANTO. Well, if I mayn't congratulate you on the title, let me congratulate you on your marvellous skill in this delicate operation of preparing the domestic ground for your refusal of the title. Your success is complete, absolute.

CULVER (sardonic.) Complete? Absolute?

TRANTO.