The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope (best fiction novels of all time .TXT) 📕

in his obstinacy,” Lord Alfred said to Mr. Lupton, who was there. It no doubt might have been wise to have allowed the merchant prince to return home with the resolution that his dinner should be abandoned. He would have repented probably before the next morning; and had he continued obdurate it would not have been difficult to explain to Celestial Majesty that something preferable had been found for that particular evening even to a banquet at the house of British commerce. The Government would probably have gained the seat for Westminster, as Melmotte would at once have become very unpopular with the great body of his supporters. But Lord De Griffin was not the man to see this. He did make his way up to Mr. Wilson, and explained to the Amphytrion of the night the demand which was made on his hospitality. A thoroughly well-established and experienced political Minister of State always feels that if he can make a friend or appease an enemy without paying a heavy price he will be doing a good stroke of business. “Bring him up,” said Mr. Wilson. “He’s going to do something out in the East, isn’t he?” “Nothing in India,” said Lord De Griffin. “The submarine telegraph is quite impossible.” Mr. Wilson, instructing some satellite to find out in what way he might properly connect Mr. Melmotte with China, sent Lord De Griffin away with his commission.

“My dear Alfred, just allow me to manage these things myself,” Mr. Melmotte was saying when the under secretary returned. “I know my own position and how to keep it. There shall be no dinner. I’ll be d⁠⸺ if any of the lot shall dine in Grosvenor Square on Monday.” Lord Alfred was so astounded that he was thinking of making his way to the Prime Minister, a man whom he abhorred and didn’t know, and of acquainting him with the terrible calamity which was threatened. But the arrival of the undersecretary saved him the trouble.

“If you will come with me,” whispered Lord De Griffin, “it shall be managed. It isn’t just the thing, but as you wish it, it shall be done.”

“I do wish it,” said Melmotte aloud. He was one of those men whom success never mollified, whose enjoyment of a point gained always demanded some hoarse note of triumph from his own trumpet.

“If you will be so kind as to follow me,” said Lord De Griffin. And so the thing was done. Melmotte, as he was taken up to the imperial footstool, was resolved upon making a little speech, forgetful at the moment of interpreters⁠—of the double interpreters whom the Majesty of China required; but the awful, quiescent solemnity of the celestial one quelled even him, and he shuffled by without saying a word even of his own banquet.

But he had gained his point, and, as he was taken home to poor Mr. Longestaffe’s house in Bruton Street, was intolerable. Lord Alfred tried to escape after putting Madame Melmotte and her daughter into the carriage, but Melmotte insisted on his presence. “You might as well come, Alfred;⁠—there are two or three things I must settle before I go to bed.”

“I’m about knocked up,” said the unfortunate man.

“Knocked up, nonsense! Think what I’ve been through. I’ve been all day at the hardest work a man can do.” Had he as usual got in first, leaving his man-of-all-work to follow, the man-of-all-work would have escaped. Melmotte, fearing such defection, put his hand on Lord Alfred’s shoulder, and the poor fellow was beaten. As they were taken home a continual sound of cock-crowing was audible, but as the words were not distinguished they required no painful attention; but when the soda water and brandy and cigars made their appearance in Mr. Longestaffe’s own back room, then the trumpet was sounded with a full blast. “I mean to let the fellows know what’s what,” said Melmotte, walking about the room. Lord Alfred had thrown himself into an armchair, and was consoling himself as best he might with tobacco. “Give and take is a very good motto. If I scratch their back, I mean them to scratch mine. They won’t find many people to spend ten thousand pounds in entertaining a guest of the country’s as a private enterprise. I don’t know of any other man of business who could do it, or would do it. It’s not much any of them can do for me. Thank God, I don’t want ’em. But if consideration is to be shown to anybody, I intend to be considered. The Prince treated me very scurvily, Alfred, and I shall take an opportunity of telling him so on Monday. I suppose a man may be allowed to speak to his own guests.”

“You might turn the election against you if you said anything the Prince didn’t like.”

“D⁠⸺ the election, sir. I stand before the electors of Westminster as a man of business, not as a courtier⁠—as a man who understands commercial enterprise, not as one of the Prince’s toadies. Some of you fellows in England don’t realise the matter yet; but I can tell you that I think myself quite as great a man as any Prince.” Lord Alfred looked at him, with strong reminiscences of the old ducal home, and shuddered. “I’ll teach them a lesson before long. Didn’t I teach ’em a lesson tonight⁠—eh? They tell me that Lord De Griffin has sixty thousand a-year to spend. What’s sixty thousand a year? Didn’t I make him go on my business? And didn’t I make ’em do as I chose? You want to tell me this and that, but I can tell you that I know more of men and women than some of you fellows do, who think you know a great deal.”

This went on through the whole of a long cigar; and afterwards, as Lord Alfred slowly paced his way back to his lodgings in Mount Street, he thought deeply whether there might not be means of escaping from his present servitude. “Beast! Brute! Pig!” he