There was a great deal of angry feeling
in Ballygore and indeed all through the constituency
when Lalage went home. It was generally believed
that O’Donoghue, Vittie, and I had somehow driven
her away, but this was quite unjust to us and we all
three felt it. We felt it particularly when,
one night at about twelve o’clock, a large crowd
visited us in turn and groaned under our windows.
O’Donoghue and Vittie, with a view to ingratiating
themselves with the electors, wrote letters to the
papers solemnly declaring that they sincerely wished
Lalage to return. Nobody believed them.
Lalage’s teaching had sunk so deep into the
popular mind that nobody would have believed anything
O’Donoghue and Vittie said even if they had
sworn its truth. Titherington, who was beginning
to recover, published a counter blast to their letters.
He was always quick to seize opportunities and he
hoped to increase my popularity by associating me
closely with Lalage. He said that I had originally
brought her to Ballygore and he left it to be understood
that I was an ardent member of the Association for
the Suppression of Public Lying. Unfortunately
nobody believed him. Lalage’s crusade had
produced an extraordinary effect. Nobody any
longer believed anything, not even the advertisements.
My nurse, among others, became affected with the prevailing
feeling of scepticism and refused to accept my word
for it that I was still seriously ill. Even when
I succeeded, by placing it against the hot water bottle
in the bottom of my bed, in running up her thermometer
to 103 degrees, she merely smiled. And yet a temperature
of that kind ought to have convinced her that I really
had violent pains somewhere.
The election itself showed unmistakably
the popular hatred of public lying. There were
just over four thousand electors in the division,
but only 530 of them recorded their votes. A good
many more, nearly a thousand more, went to the polling
booths and deliberately spoiled their voting papers.
The returning officer, who kindly came round to my
hotel to announce the result, told me that he had
never seen so many spoiled votes at any election.
The usual way of invalidating the voting paper was
to bracket the three names and write “All of
them liars” across the paper. Sometimes
the word “liars” was qualified by a profane
adjective. Sometimes distinctions were made between
the candidates and one of us was declared to be a
more skilful or determined liar than the other two.
O’Donoghue was sometimes placed in the position
of the superlative degree of comparison. So was
I. But Vittie suffered most frequently in this way.
Lalage had always displayed a special virulence in
dealing with Vittie’s public utterances.
The remaining voters, 2470 of them or thereabouts,
made a silent protest against our deceitfulness by
staying away from the polling booths altogether.
O’Donoghue was elected.
He secured 262 of the votes which were not spoiled.
I ran him very close, having 260 votes to my credit.
Vittie came a bad third, with only eight votes.
Vittie, as Titherington told me from the first, never
had a chance of success. He was only nominated
in the hope that he might take some votes away from
me. I hope his friends were satisfied with the
result. Three of his eight votes would have given
me a majority. Titherington wrote me a long letter
some time afterward, as soon, in fact, as he was well
enough to do sums. He said that originally, before
Lalage came on the scene, I had 1800 firm and reliable
supporters, men who would have walked miles through
snowstorms to cast their votes for me. O’Donoghue
had about the same number who would have acted with
equal self-denial on his behalf. Vittie was tolerably
sure of two hundred voters and there were about two
hundred others who hesitated between Vittie and me,
but would rather cut off their right hands than vote
for O’Donoghue. I ought, therefore, to have
been elected, and I would have been elected, if Lalage
had not turned the minds of the voters away from serious
political thought. “I do not know,”
Titherington wrote in a sort of parenthesis, “whether
these women hope to advance their cause by tactics
of this kind. If they do they are making a bad
mistake. No right-thinking man will ever consent
to the enfranchisement of a sex capable of treating
political life with the levity displayed here by Miss
Beresford.” It is very curious how hard
Titherington finds it to believe that he has made a
mistake. He will probably go down to his grave
maintaining that the letters A.S.P.L. stand for woman’s
suffrage, although I pointed out to him more than once
that they do not.
The latter part of Titherington’s
letter was devoted to a carefully reasoned explanation
of the actual victory of O’Donoghue. He
accounted for it in two ways. O’Donoghue’s
supporters, being inferior in education and general
intelligence to mine, were less likely to be affected
by new and heretical doctrines such as Lalage’s.
A certain amount of mental activity is required in
order to go wrong. Also, Lalage’s professed
admiration for truth made its strongest appeal to
my supporters, because O’Donoghue’s friends
were naturally addicted to lying and loved falsehood
for its own sake. My side was, in fact, beaten I
have noticed that this is the case in many elections because
it was intellectually and morally the better side.
This theory would have been very consoling to me if
I had wanted consolation. I did not. I was
far from grudging O’Donoghue his victory.
He, so far as I can learn, is just the man to enjoy
hearing other people make long speeches. I have
never developed a taste for that form of amusement.
The day after the declaration of the
result of the election a really serious misfortune
befell me. McMeekin himself took influenza.
There was a time when I wished very much to hear that
he was writhing in the grip of the disease. But
those feelings had long passed away from my mind.
I no longer wished any ill to McMeekin. I valued
him highly as a medical attendant, and I particularly
needed his skill just when he was snatched away from
me, because my nurse was becoming restive. She
hinted at first, and then roundly asserted that I
was perfectly well. Nothing but McMeekin’s
determined diagnosis of obscure affections of my heart,
lungs, and viscera kept her to her duties. She
made more than one attempt to take me out for a drive.
I resisted her, knowing that a drive would, in the
end, take me to the railway station and from that home
to be embroiled in the contest between Lalage and
the Diocesan Synod. I had a letter from my mother
urging me to return home at once and hinting at the
possibility of unpleasantness over the election of
the new bishop. This made me the more determined
to stay where I was, and so McMeekin’s illness
was a very serious blow to me.
I satisfied myself by inquiry that
he was not likely to get well immediately and then
I sent for another doctor. This man turned out
to be one of my original supporters and I think his
feelings must have been hurt by my calling in McMeekin.
He had also, I could see, been greatly influenced
by Lalage. He told me, with insulting directness
of speech, that there was nothing the matter with
me. I could not remember the names of the diseases
which McMeekin said I had or might develop. The
nurse, who could have remembered them if she liked,
would not. The new doctor, an aggressive, red-faced
young man, repeated his statement that I was perfectly
well. He emphasized it by refusing to take a fee.
My nurse, with evident delight, packed her box and
left by the next train. After that there was
nothing for me but to go home.
My mother must have been disappointed
at the result of the East Connor election. She
believed, I fear she still believes, that I am fitted
to make laws and would be happy in the work.
But she has great tact. She did not, by either
word or glance, condole with me over my defeat.
I also possess a little tact, so I
did not exult or express any gratification in her
presence. We neither of us mentioned the subject
of the election. My uncle Thormanby, on the other
hand, has no tact at all. He came over to luncheon
the day after I arrived home. We had scarcely
sat down at table when he began to jeer.
“Well,” he said, speaking
in his usual hearty full-throated way, “better
luck next time.”
“I am not sure,” I said,
with dignified coolness, “that there will be
a next time.”
“Oh, yes, there will. ’He
who fights and runs away will live to fight another
day.’”
I did not see how the proverb applied to me.
“Do you mean the influenza?”
I said. “That was scarcely my fault.
My temperature was 104.”
“All the same,” said Thormanby,
“you didn’t exactly stand up to her, did
you?”
I understood then that he was thinking about La-lage.
“Nor did O’Donoghue,”
I said. “And Vittie really was shamming.
Titherington told me so.”
“Influenza or no influenza,
I shouldn’t have sat down under the things that
girl was saying about you.”
“What would you have done?”
“I should have put her in her
place pretty quick. I’m sorry I wasn’t
there.”
As a matter of fact Thormanby had
taken very good care not to be there. He had
washed his hands and put the whole responsibility on
the shoulders of Miss Battersby and Miss Pettigrew.
I felt it my duty to bring this home to his conscience.
“Why didn’t you come?”
I asked. “We’d have been very pleased
to see you.”
“Peers,” he replied, “are
not allowed to interfere in elections.”
This, of course, was a mere subterfuge.
I was not inclined to let Thormanby escape.
“You’ll have every opportunity,”
I said, “of putting her in her place without
running your head against the British constitution.
She means to take an active part in electing the new
bishop.”
“Nonsense. There’s
no part for her to take. That’s a matter
for the synod of the diocese and she won’t be
allowed into its meetings.”
“All the same she’ll manage
to get in. But of course that won’t matter.
You’ll put her in her place pretty quick.”
Thormanby’s tone was distinctly
less confident when he next spoke.
“Do you happen to know,”
he asked, “what she means to do?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Could you possibly find out? She might
tell you if you asked her.”
“I don’t intend to ask her. I have
washed my hands of the whole affair.”
My mother came into the conversation at this point.
“Lalage hasn’t confided
in me,” she said, “but she has told Miss
Battersby ”
“Ah!” I said, “Miss
Battersby is so wonderfully sympathetic. Anybody
would confide in her.”
“She told Miss Battersby,”
my mother went on, “that she was studying the
situation and looking into the law of the matter.”
“Let her stick to that,” said Thormanby.
“Are Hilda and Selby-Harrison down here?”
I asked.
“Hilda is,” said my mother.
“I don’t know about the other. Who
is he or she?”
“He,” I said, “is
the third member of the committee of the Episcopal
Election Guild. He’s particularly good at
drawing up agreements. I expect the Archdeacon
will have to sign one. By the way, I suppose he’s
the proper man to vote for?”
“I’m supporting him,”
said Thormanby, “so I suppose you will.”
I do not like being hustled in this way. “I
shall study the situation,” I said, “before
I make up my mind. I am a life member of the Episcopal
Election Guild and I must allow myself to be guided
to some extent by the decision of the committee.”
“Do you mean to tell me,”
said Thormanby, “that you’ve given that
girl money again?”
“Not again. My original
subscription carries me on from one society to another.
Selby-Harrison arranged about that.”
“I should have thought,”
said Thormanby sulkily, “that you’d had
warnings enough. You will never learn sense even
if you live to be a hundred.”
I saw the Archdeacon next day.
He tackled the subject of my defeat in East Connor
without hesitation. He has even less tact than
Thormanby.
“I’m sorry for you, my
dear boy,” he said, wringing my hand, “more
sorry than I can tell you. These disappointments
are very hard to bear at your age. When you are
as old as I am and know how many of them life has in
store for all of us, you will not feel them nearly
so acutely.”
“I’m trying to bear up,” I said.
“Your defeat is a public loss.
I feel that very strongly. After your diplomatic
experience and with your knowledge of foreign affairs
your advice would have been invaluable in all questions
of imperial policy.”
“I’m greatly gratified
to hear you say that. I was afraid you thought
I had taken to drink.”
“My dear boy,” said the
Archdeacon with pained surprise, “what can have
put such an idea into your head?”
“I couldn’t help knowing
what was in your mind that day in Dublin when I spoke
to you about Lalage’s Jun. Soph. Ord.”
I could see that the Archdeacon was
uncomfortable. He had certainly entertained suspicions
when we parted in St. Stephen’s Green, though
he might now pretend to have forgotten them.
“You thought so then,”
I went on, “though it was quite early in the
day.”
“Not at all. I happened
to be in a hurry. That is all. I knew perfectly
well it was only your manner.”
“I don’t blame you in
the least. Anybody might have thought just as
you did.”
“But I didn’t. I
knew you were upset at the time. You were anxious
about Lalage Beresford. She’s a charming
girl, with a very good heart, but ”
The Archdeacon hesitated.
“But ” I said, encouraging
him to go on.
“Did you hear,” he said,
anxiously, “that she intends to take part in
the episcopal election? A rumour to that effect
has reached me.”
“I have it on the best authority that she does.”
“Tut, tut,” said the Archdeacon.
“Do you tell me so? Tut, tut. But
that is quite impossible and most undesirable, for
her own sake most undesirable.”
“We’re all relying on you to prevent scandal.”
“Your uncle, Lord Thormanby ”
“He’ll put her in her
place. He’s promised to do so. And
that will be all right as far as it goes. But
the question is will she stay there. That’s
where you come in, Archdeacon. Once she’s
in her place it will be your business, as Archdeacon,
to keep her there.”
“I’ll speak to her father
about it,” said the Archdeacon. “Beresford
must put his foot down.”
“He’s going to Brazil. He told me
so.”
“We can’t have that.
He must stay here. It’s perfectly impossible
for him to leave the country at present. I’ll
see him this evening.”
I told my mother that night that I
had studied the situation long enough and was fully
determined to cast my vote for the Archdeacon.
“He is thoroughly well fitted
to be a bishop,” I said. “He told
me to-day that my knowledge of foreign affairs would
be most valuable to the government whenever questions
of imperial policy turned up.”
My mother seemed a little puzzled.
“What has that got to do with the bishopric?”
she asked.
“The remark,” I said,
“shows me the kind of man the Archdeacon is.
No one who was not full of suave dignity and sympathetic
diplomacy could have said a thing like that.
What more do you want in a bishop?”
“A great deal more,” said
my mother, who takes these church questions seriously.
“He also undertook,” I
said, “to keep Lalage in her place once she is
put there.”
“If he does that ”
“I quite agree with you.
If he does that he ought to be a bishop, or a Metropolitan,
if not a Patriarch. That’s why I’m
going to vote for him.”