The Marriage of William Ashe
BY MRS. HUMPHRY WARD
CHAPTER XI
THE spring freshness of London had long since departed. A crowded season: much animation in Parliament, where the Government to its own amazement had rather gained than lost ground; industrial trouble at home, and foreign complications abroad; and in London the steady growth of a new plutocracy, the result, so far, of American wealth and American brides,—in the first week of July, the outward things of the moment might have been thus summed up by any careful observer.
On a certain Tuesday night, the debate on a private member's bill unexpectedly collapsed, and the House rose early. Ashe left the House with his secretary, but parted from him at the corner of Birdcage Walk, and crossed the park alone. He meant to join Kitty at a party in Piccadilly; there was just time to go home and dress; and he walked at a quick pace.
Two members sitting on the same side of the House with himself were also going home. One of them noticed the Under-Secretary.
"A very ineffective statement Ashe made to-night—don't you think so?" he said to his companion.
"Very! Really if the government can't take up a stronger line, the general public will begin to think there's something in it."
"Oh! if you only shriek long enough and sharp enough in England something's sure to come of it. Cliffe and his group have been playing their cards very cleverly. The government will get their Agreement approved all right, but Cliffe has certainly made some people on our side uneasy. However—"
"However—what?" said the other, after a moment.
"I wish I thought that were the only reason for Ashe's change of tone," said the first speaker, slowly.
"What do you mean?"
The two were intimate personal friends, belonging moreover to a group of Evangelical families well known in English life; but even so the answer came with reluctance:
"Well, you see, it's not very easy to grapple in public with the man whose name all smart London happens to be coupling with that of your wife!"
"I say!"—the other stood still, in genuine consternation and distress,—"you don't mean to say that there's that in it!"
"You notice that the difference is not in what Ashe says, but in how he says it. He avoids all personal collision with Cliffe. The government stick to their case, but Ashe mentions everybody but Cliffe, and confutes all arguments but his. And meanwhile, of course, the truth is that Cliffe is the head and front of the campaign, and if he threw up to-morrow, everything would quiet down."
"And Lady Kitty is flirting with him at this particular moment? Damned bad taste and bad feeling, to say the least of it!"
"You won't find one of the Bristol lot consider that kind of thing when their blood is up!" said the other. "You remember the tales of old Lord Blackwater?"
"But is there really any truth in it? Or is it mere gossip?"
"Well, I hear that the behavior of both of them at Grosville Park last week was such that Lady Grosville vows she will never ask either of them again. And at Ascot, at Lord's—the Opera—Lady Kitty sits with him, talks with him, walks with him, the whole time, and won't look at any one else. They must be asked together or neither will come,—and 'society,' as far as I can make out, thinks it a good joke and is always making plans to throw them together."
"Can't Lady Tranmore do anything?"
