Delphi Works of Ford Madox Ford (Illustrated) (487 page)

Mr. Pett chirped with a cheerful intonation: “They won’t put them in, you know.”

“Then if they won’t,” the Countess said, “I’ll get the whole infamous story printed in a pamphlet.”

“I don’t believe you’ll be able to get it printed,” Mr Pett said.

The Countess sneered: “Oh, I can keep within the law of libel; I’ve studied it’

“I wasn’t thinking of the law of libel, I was thinking of the Printers’ Trades Union. And I have taken precious good care that the Printers’ Trades Union won’t print anything that will damage the counter-revolution. I’ve promised them a special law enacting that every printer of Galizia shall be paid much better money and work much shorter hours than even that Union could ever get in England.”

“What an infamous scoundrel you are!” the Countess said.” And what an infamous state of things you disclose!”

“Oh, that’s only Socialism,” Mr. Pett said. “Socialism logically and efficiently carried out. There’s not a single Union Printer in England that hasn’t had notice not to print anything dangerous about Galizia. There’s not a paper in London that dare print it, because it would throw it’s composing room into chaos in a minute. The subject is absolutely dead. You won’t be able to get a word said about it, even in the Radical papers. That’s the efficient way these things are done. Of course, you may find a small non-Union printer who will set up the pamphlets for you, but I doubt if he could get his machining done for him. You’ve no idea of what a splendid censorship the Union can set up.”

“My God,” the Countess exclaimed, “I should like to tear your traitorous tongue out! I think you are the worst devil of them all in the gigantic conspiracy there is against me and my wrongs. It isn’t only that you have betrayed all your friends! It isn’t only that you are reactionary! It isn’t only that you are betraying Society! It isn’t only that you are a remorseless villain murdering the New Thought that you pretended to advocate! You wolf in sheep’s clothing!”

Mr. Pett, who had become rather white, said: “Leave it at that, will you?”

“Oh, I’ll leave it at that,” the Countess said. “There’s plenty more to go on with. That is enough to start your miserable little blood-worm of a conscience gnawing inside you. You won’t sleep very well, now I’ve pointed out to you what an odious object the world considers you.... And then I come to your infamous treacheries to myself. You pretended to be my friend, and you have sold me to Macdonald. It’s you who’ve acquiesced in all I said of him. You believed me when I said that he took money of Kintyre as the price of his own dishonour! You believed me when I said that he took money of his mistress to give to his creature! You believed me when I said that he had deserted me and left me to starve until now the laws of my country have forced him to give me the pittance that is my due!”

“Oh, so you’ve got your decree of restitution?” Mr. Pett said cheerfully.

“Every paper in the land,” the Countess answered, “echoed yesterday with the story of my wrongs. I didn’t leave anything out that I could get in.”

“Oh, you couldn’t get much into a petition for decree of restitution,” Mr. Pett said.

“I’ve got enough,” the Countess answered. “You should have seen the placards yesterday. There wasn’t one that didn’t have ‘Russian Count’ or ‘Society Scandal’ on it.”

“I’m glad I was in the country,” Mr. Pett answered. “Macdonald’s the noblest and finest soul I ever came across, and you aren’t fit to breathe the air on the same globe with him.”

Mr. Pett glanced rather nervously at the two gentlemen from the Peninsula. For the moment he had forgotten himself, but Mrs. Pett said:

“Thank you, Herbert. That was very good of you, Herbert, to do yourself credit.”

The Countess cast what she would have called a look of contempt one after the other at all the faces before her.

“Then you are all in this disgusting conspiracy?” she said. “I wonder if any of you can sleep at night? But I suppose you can. You are that sort of toad.” — She addressed Mr. Pett directly. “That’s what you are,” she said. “A toad. Macdonald is a viper, but he’s such a fool that he doesn’t know what he’s doing. You know better. That’s what makes you a toad. Something noxious! Something filthy! You know all those facts about Macdonald, and yet you associate with him! My God! I shouldn’t wonder if you used them for your own ends! I shouldn’t wonder if you used them to blackmail him!”

Mr. Pett stood perfectly still for a moment or so. His face became rather puffy, and then suddenly he dropped on to the floor. There was a good deal of confusion. Mrs. Pett screamed out, and the dinner-gong rang outside, and the next moment the servant came in and announced, as she had been bidden to do:

“His Grace the Duke of Kintyre.”

Mrs. Pett and no less than eight efficient servants were attending to the necessities of Mr. Pett, who lay quite still. The two dark gentlemen from the Peninsula removed themselves unostentatiously from the house, and Mrs. Pett, looking up from above the form of her husband, which resembled that of a drowned man to whom they were applying resuscitatory methods with a quiet discipline, remarked to Kintyre:

“You’d better take the Countess into the dining-room.” They were no sooner in that room than the Countess remarked with an expression of triumphant joy:

“Didn’t I do that well?”

Kintyre reflected for a moment. “I don’t know what you’ve done,” he said. “But poor Pett faints very easily when he’s excited. And if you didn’t do any more than make him faint, I don’t think it’s much of an achievement for a woman of your power.”

“Well, I told him he was a blackmailer,” the Countess said.

“That was decidedly considerate,” Kintyre exclaimed.

“And I told him,” the Countess answered, “that I was going to blow on the whole show of the Galizian counterrevolution.”

“That’s quite a considerate proceeding too,” the Duke remarked.

“I shall go,” the Countess said, “to the city of Flores and denounce the whole scheme to the Republican Ministry.”

“That would be quite a good thing to do,” Kintyre said, “except that they know all about it already.”

“I don’t believe it,” she said.

“Well, you needn’t,” he answered. “I dare say a trip to Flores wouldn’t do you any harm. But you won’t really gain anything by it.”

“I shall stop Sergius Mihailovitch’s little game!” she exclaimed.

“Oh no, you won’t,” he answered, “because the poor ministry, like me and unlike you, haven’t got any money.”

“That’s a cool thing to say,” the Countess said. “You know very well...”

“If you’re going to say,” Kintyre interrupted, “that owing to the infamous desertion of you by Macdonald you’re starving and penniless, you may as well save yourself the trouble I know perfectly well that you’ve got plenty of money saved up. Plenty of money! And that Sergius Mihailovitch is paying you his income from the Russian Government through a third person.”

The Countess smiled: “I’m giving him a pretty good dance for his money,” she said. “Don’t you think so?”

“Oh, I think you’ve done quite enough,” Kintyre answered. “I should advise you to drop it now.”

The Countess did what she would have called starting. “Do you dare to say that?’ she said.” You!”

He reflected for just a minute, and then said cautiously: “My dear Margaret, I really think the time has come to drop it. You have, in fact, to drop either it or me. Do you understand?”

She surveyed him hardily and ironically for several minutes.

“Which do you think I’ll drop?” she asked.

“I guess,” he answered, cynically too, “it’s just a toss up. On the one hand, you’ve got the chance of making yourself a little hell upon earth to half a dozen people. That’s a very pleasant job. You’re having the time of your life, I know.”

“I’m not denying it,” she answered.

“And, on the other hand,” the Duke continued, “you’ve got a lover with a strawberry-leaved coronet. That’s gratifying to your pride. Enormously gratifying!”

“I’ll agree,” she answered, “if you put husband instead of lover.”

“I’ve never said I’d be your husband,” Kintyre said. “I’ve said I’d give you what you wanted. You know perfectly well I can’t possibly afford to marry you if you don’t behave yourself. I don’t say I shall if I can, but the position is perfectly simple.”

“Oh, the position is perfectly simple,” the Countess laughed at him. “If you don’t marry me Sergius Mihailovitch won’t get his divorce.”

“If you play old billy any more with Sergius Mihailovitch’s schemes,” the Duke said, “I can’t possibly afford to marry you, because I shall drop such a lot of money. So that really it depends whether you prefer the chance of making yourself a beastly nuisance to the chance of the coronet that you want. It’s perfectly simple.”

“Oh, it’s perfectly simple!” the Countess echoed.

“I didn’t come here to see you,” Kintyre continued. “I came here to address an observation to Mr. Pett, but I may as well tell you that until these things are entirely settled I’m not going to come and see you again.”

She seemed for a moment to drop him out of her observation and to be reflecting aloud.

“So the excellent Mr. Pett,” she said, “
has
been trying to blackmail Macdonald by means of the information I gave him? And you have come here with the intention of horse-whipping Mr. Pett?”

“It’s only a dog-whip,” the Duke said mildly.

“Yes, I saw it in the hall,” she answered. Then she exclaimed, “And you tell me that I didn’t do it well!”

“But it was so jolly easy,” the Duke remonstrated mildly.

“It doesn’t matter whether it was easy or difficult,” she said. “The point was to hit as many persons as possible with one shot. And I’ve done that.”

“You’ve done that almost too well,” the Duke exclaimed. “You’ve hit me too.”

“Oh, I know all about that,” the Countess answered. “The amiable Mr. Pett has told Sergius Mihailovitch that I told him that you paid Sergius Mihailovitch in order to be allowed to make love to me. And that poor twopenny- halfpenny fool of a Sergius Mihailovitch has told you that he won’t speak to you again. I know about the creature’s muddled brain-works. And, of course, it’s hit you remarkably hard. I meant it to. I know the silly way you adore Sergius Mihailovitch, and I always wanted to detach you from him. I guess I’ve done that.”

“I don’t know so much,” the Duke said.”

“But you’re passionately in love with me,” she remarked.

“Now, am I?” the Duke said reflectively.

“Oh yes, you are,” she said, with assurance. “You can’t keep your eyes off me. You don’t know how to talk, but if you could talk you’d say that you are fascinated by me as you would be by a snake.”

“I mayn’t know how to talk,” Kintyre said, “but I can put it better than that. Did you ever see a courtship of spiders? The female always eats the male, you know.” The Countess merely answered: “All right. Put it how you like.”

“Well then, good-bye,” the Duke said.

She looked at him with surprise. “You don’t mean to say you’re afraid of being eaten?” she asked.

‘‘Oh, I’m not in the least afraid of being eaten,” he answered, “but I’m enormously afraid of treating Sergius Mihailovitch dishonourably. If you can’t put me into a position to treat him honourably, I’ve done with you.”

“Well, state your terms,” she said.

“The position is perfectly plain,” he answered. “If you don’t make it possible for me to marry you, I’ve got to drop you. I’ve got to drop you altogether. I couldn’t possibly make you my mistress...”

“You couldn’t possibly ever do that,” she said.