To this he replied that he would certainly come back to the rooms in Great Marlborough Street, should he be lucky enough to find them vacant, and he expressed his willingness to take them on and from the 1st of February. And on the 3rd of February he found himself in the old quarters, Mrs. Bunce having contrived, with much conjugal adroitness, both to keep Miss Pouncefoot and to stave off the Equity draftsman’s wife and baby. Bunce, however, received Phineas very coldly, and told his wife the same evening that as far as he could see their lodger would never turn up to be a trump in the matter of the ballot. “If he means well, why did he go and stay with them lords down in Scotland? I knows all about it. I knows a man when I sees him. Mr. Low, who’s looking out to be a Tory judge some of these days, is a deal better;—because he knows what he’s after.”
Immediately on his return to town, Phineas found himself summoned to a political meeting at Mr. Mildmay’s house in St. James’s Square. “We’re going to begin in earnest this time,” Barrington Erle said to him at the club.
“I am glad of that,” said Phineas.
“I suppose you heard all about it down at Loughlinter?”
Now, in truth, Phineas had heard very little of any settled plan down at Loughlinter. He had played a game of chess with Mr. Gresham, and had shot a stag with Mr. Palliser, and had discussed sheep with Lord Brentford, but had hardly heard a word about politics from any one of those influential gentlemen. From Mr. Monk he had heard much of a coming Reform Bill; but his communications with Mr. Monk had rather been private discussions—in which he had learned Mr. Monk’s own views on certain points—than revelations on the intention of the party to which Mr. Monk belonged. “I heard of nothing settled,” said Phineas; “but I suppose we are to have a Reform Bill.”
“That is a matter of course.”
“And I suppose we are not to touch the question of ballot.”
“That’s the difficulty,” said Barrington Erle. “But of course we shan’t touch it as long as Mr. Mildmay is in the Cabinet. He will never consent to the ballot as First Minister of the Crown.”
“Nor would Gresham, or Palliser,” said Phineas, who did not choose to bring forward his greatest gun at first.
“I don’t know about Gresham. It is impossible to say what Gresham might bring himself to do. Gresham is a man who may go any lengths before he has done. Planty Pall,”—for such was the name by which Mr. Plantagenet Palliser was ordinarily known among his friends—“would of course go with Mr. Mildmay and the Duke.”
“And Monk is opposed to the ballot,” said Phineas.
“Ah, that’s the question. No doubt he has assented to the proposition of a measure without the ballot; but if there should come a row, and men like Turnbull demand it, and the London mob kick up a shindy, I don’t know how far Monk would be steady.”
“Whatever he says, he’ll stick to.”
“He is your leader, then?” asked Barrington.
“I don’t know that I have a leader. Mr. Mildmay leads our side; and if anybody leads me, he does. But I have great faith in Mr. Monk.”
“There’s one who would go for the ballot tomorrow, if it were brought forward stoutly,” said Barrington Erle to Mr. Ratler a few minutes afterwards, pointing to Phineas as he spoke.
“I don’t think much of that young man,” said Ratler.
Mr. Bonteen and Mr. Ratler had put their heads together during that last evening at Loughlinter, and had agreed that they did not think much of Phineas Finn. Why did Mr. Kennedy go down off the mountain to get him a pony? And why did Mr. Gresham play chess with him? Mr. Ratler and Mr. Bonteen may have been right in making up their minds to think but little of Phineas Finn, but Barrington Erle had been quite wrong when he had said that Phineas would “go for the ballot” tomorrow. Phineas had made up his mind very strongly that he would always oppose the ballot. That he would hold the same opinion throughout his life, no one should pretend to say; but in his present mood, and under the tuition which he had received from Mr. Monk, he was prepared to demonstrate, out of the House and in it, that the ballot was, as a political measure, unmanly, ineffective, and enervating. Enervating had been a great word with Mr. Monk, and Phineas had clung to it with admiration.
The meeting took place at Mr. Mildmay’s on the third day of the session. Phineas had of course heard of such meetings before, but had never attended one. Indeed, there had been no such gathering when Mr. Mildmay’s party came into power early in the last session. Mr. Mildmay and his men had then made their effort in turning out their opponents, and had been well pleased to rest awhile upon their oars.
