That same afternoon he met Mr. Gresham in one of the passages leading to the House, and the Prime Minister put his arm through that of our hero as they walked together into the lobby. “I am sorry that we are losing you,” said Mr. Gresham.
“You may be sure that I am sorry to be so lost,” said Phineas.
“These things will occur in political life,” said the leader; “but I think that they seldom leave rancour behind them when the purpose is declared, and when the subject of disagreement is marked and understood. The defalcation which creates angry feeling is that which has to be endured without previous warning—when a man votes against his party—or a set of men, from private pique or from some cause which is never clear.” Phineas, when he heard this, knew well how terribly this very man had been harassed, and driven nearly wild, by defalcation, exactly of that nature which he was attempting to describe. “No doubt you and Mr. Monk think you are right,” continued Mr. Gresham.
“We have given strong evidence that we think so,” said Phineas. “We give up our places, and we are, both of us, very poor men.”
“I think you are wrong, you know, not so much in your views on the question itself—which, to tell the truth, I hardly understand as yet.”
“We will endeavour to explain them.”
“And will do so very clearly, no doubt. But I think that Mr. Monk was wrong in desiring, as a member of a Government, to force a measure which, whether good or bad, the Government as a body does not desire to initiate—at any rate, just now.”
“And therefore he resigned,” said Phineas.
“Of course. But it seems to me that he failed to comprehend the only way in which a great party can act together, if it is to do any service in this country. Don’t for a moment think that I am blaming him or you.”
“I am nobody in this matter,” said Phineas.
“I can assure you, Mr. Finn, that we have not regarded you in that light, and I hope that the time may come when we may be sitting together again on the same bench.”
Neither on the Treasury bench nor on any other in that House was he to sit again after this fashion! That was the trouble which was crushing his spirit at this moment, and not the loss of his office! He knew that he could not venture to think of remaining in London as a member of Parliament with no other income than that which his father could allow him, even if he could again secure a seat in Parliament. When he had first been returned for Loughshane he had assured his friends that his duty as a member of the House of Commons would not be a bar to his practice in the Courts. He had now been five years a member, and had never once made an attempt at doing any part of a barrister’s work. He had gone altogether into a different line of life, and had been most successful;—so successful that men told him, and women more frequently than men, that his career had been a miracle of success. But there had been, as he had well known from the first, this drawback in the new profession which he had chosen, that nothing in it could be permanent. They who succeed in it, may probably succeed again; but then the success is intermittent, and there may be years of hard work in opposition, to which, unfortunately, no pay is assigned. It is almost imperative, as he now found, that they who devote themselves to such a profession should be men of fortune. When he had commenced his work—at the period of his first return for Loughshane—he had had no thought of mending his deficiency in this respect by a rich marriage. Nor had it ever occurred to him that he would seek a marriage for that purpose. Such an idea would have been thoroughly distasteful to him. There had been no stain of premeditated mercenary arrangement upon him at any time. But circumstances had so fallen out with him, that as he won his spurs in Parliament, as he became known, and was placed first in one office and then in another, prospects of love and money together were opened to him, and he ventured on, leaving Mr. Low and the law behind him—because these prospects were so alluring. Then had come Mr. Monk and Mary Flood Jones—and everything around him had collapsed.
Everything around him had collapsed—with, however, a terrible temptation to him to inflate his sails again, at the cost of his truth and his honour. The temptation would have affected him not at all, had Madame Goesler been ugly, stupid, or personally disagreeable. But she was, he thought, the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, the most witty, and in many respects the most charming. She had offered to give him everything that she had, so to place him in the world that opposition would be more pleasant to him than office, to supply every want, and had done so in a manner that had gratified all his vanity. But he had refused it all, because he was bound to the girl at Floodborough. My readers will probably say that he was not a true man unless he could do this without a regret. When Phineas thought of it all, there were many regrets.
But there was at the same time a resolve on his
