“We shall have to take stock and begin the issue of ration tickets as soon as possible.”
“Twelve-weeks’ supply; how long will that last the country under your arrangements?”
The Colonial Secretary made a rapid calculation on a sheet of paper.
“As we shall need to carry on till the next harvest, I suppose it means that the daily ration will have to be reduced to less than a quarter of the full amount—three-thirteenths, to be exact.”
“And you are satisfied with that calculation?”
The Colonial Secretary glanced over his figures.
“Yes, I see no reason to alter it. Naturally it will mean great privation; and the working class will be difficult to keep in hand; but I see no objection to carrying on till next year when the harvest will be due. The potato crop will come in early and help us.”
Nordenholt looked at him for a moment and then laughed contemptuously. Suddenly his almost pedantic phraseology dropped away.
“Simpson, you beat the band. I never heard anything like it.”
Then his manner changed abruptly.
“Do you mean to say,” he asked roughly, “that you haven’t realised yet that there will be no next harvest? Don’t you understand that things have changed, once for all? The soil is done for. There will be no crops again until every inch of it is revivified in some way. ‘The potato crop will come in early and help us!’ I’ve consulted some men who know; and they tell me that within a year it will be impossible to raise more than a small fraction even of the worst crop we ever saw in this country.”
The Premier was the only one of the three who stood fast under this blow.
“That is certainly a serious matter, Nordenholt,” he said; “but there is nothing to be gained from hard words. Let us think over the case, and I feel sure that some way out of this apparent impasse can be found. Surely some of these scientific experts could suggest something which might get us out of the difficulty. I don’t despair. Past experience has always shown that with care one can avoid most awkward embarrassments.”
“The ‘awkward embarrassment,’ as you call it, amounts to this. How are you going to feed fifty millions of people for an indefinite time when your supplies are only capable of feeding them normally for twelve weeks? Put them on ‘three-thirteenth rations’ as Simpson suggests; and when the next harvest comes in you will find you have a good deal less than ‘three-thirteenth rations’ per head for them. What’s your solution, Biles? You will have to produce it quick; for every hour you sit thinking means a bigger inroad into the available supplies. Remember, this is something new in your experience. You aren’t up against a majority you can wheedle into taking your advice. This time you are up against plain facts of Nature; and arguments are out of court. Now I ask a plain question; and I’m going to get a straight answer from you for once: What are your plans?”
The Premier pondered the matter in silence for a couple of minutes; then, apparently, the instinct of the old Parliamentary hand came uppermost in his mind. The habits of thought which have lasted through a generation cannot be broken instantaneously. With a striving after dignity, which was only half successful he said:
“Parliament is about to meet. I shall go there and lay this matter before the Great Inquest of the nation and let them decide.”
“Three days wasted; and probably two days of talk at least before anything is settled; then two days more before you can bring anything into gear: one week’s supplies eaten up and nothing to show for it. Is that your solution?”
“Yes.”
“You are determined on that? No wavering?”
“No.”
“Very good, Biles. I give you the fairest warning. On the day that you meet the House of Commons, I shall place upon the paper a series of questions which will expose the very root of the Mazanderan scandal, and I shall supply full information on the subject to the Opposition Press. I have had every document in my possession for the last year. I can prove that you yourself were in it up to the neck; I have notes of all the transactions with Rimanez and Co. And I know all about the Party Funds also. If that once gets into print, Biles, you are done for—thumbs down!”
He imitated the old death sign of the Roman arena. The Premier sat as if frozen in his chair. His face had gone a dirty grey. Nordenholt towered over him with contempt on his features. Suddenly the Colonial Secretary sprang to his feet.
“This is blackmail, Nordenholt,” he cried furiously. “Do you think you can do that sort of thing and not be touched? You may think you are safe behind your millions; but if you carried out your threat there isn’t a decent man who would speak to you again. You daren’t do it!”
“If you speak to me like that again, Simpson, I’ll take care that no decent man speaks to you either,” Nordenholt said, calmly. “There’s another set of notes besides those on Mazanderan. I have the whole dossier of the house in Carshalton Terrace in my desk. I’ll publish them too, unless you come to heel. It will be worse than Mazanderan, Simpson. It will be prison.”
In his turn, the Colonial Secretary collapsed into his chair. Whatever the threat had been, it had evidently brought him face to face with ruin; and guilt was written across his face.
But Saxenham had paid no attention to this interruption. In his slow way he was evidently turning over in his mind what Nordenholt had said to the Prime Minister; and now he spoke almost in a tone of anguish:
“Johnnie, Johnnie,” he said. “Deny it! Deny it at once. You can’t sit under that foul charge. Our hands were clean, weren’t they?
