One of Our Conquerors - World eBook Library

George Meredith
get home. You don’t believe in intimations? I’ve had crapy
processions all day before my eyes. No wonder, after yesterday!’
‘Dubbleson mustn’t drawl it out too long,’ said Fenellan.
‘We ‘ll drop a hint. Where’s Dartrey?’
‘He’ll come. He’s in one of his black moods: not temper.
He’s got a notion he killed his wife by dragging her to Africa
with him. She was not only ready to go, she was glad to go.
She had a bit of the heroine in her and a certainty of tripping
to the deuce if she was left to herself.’
‘Tell Nataly that,’ said Victor. ‘And tell her about Dartrey.
Harp on it. Once she was all for him and our girl. But it’s a
woman—though the dearest! I defy any one to hit on the
cause of their changes. We must make the best of things, if
we’re for swimming. The task for me to-night will be, to
keep from rolling out all I’ve got in my head. And I’m not
revolutionary, I’m for stability. Only I do see, that the firm
stepping-place asks for a long stride to be taken. One can’t
get the English to take a stride—unless it’s for a foot behind
them: bother old Colney! Too timid, or too scrupulous, down
we go into the mire. There!—But I want to say it! I want to
save the existing order. I want, Christianity, instead of the
Mammonism we ‘re threatened with. Great fortunes now
are becoming the giants of old to stalk the land: or mediaeval
Barons. Dispersion of wealth, is the secret. Nataly’s of
that mind with me. A decent poverty! She’s rather wearying,
wants a change. I’ve a steam-yacht in my eye, for next month
on the Mediterranean. All our set. She likes quiet. I believe
in my political recipe for it.’
He thumped on a method he had for preserving aristocracy—true
aristocracy, amid a positively democratic flood of
riches.
‘It appears to me, you’re on the road of Priscilla Graves and
Pempton,’ observed Simeon. ‘Strike off Priscilla’s viands and
friend Pempton’s couple of glasses, and there’s your aristocracy
established; but with rather a dispersed recognition of itself.’
‘Upon my word, you talk like old Colney, except for a
twang of your own,’ said Victor. ‘Colney sours at every fresh
number of that Serial. The last, with Delphica detecting the
plot of Falarique, is really not so bad. The four disguised
members of the Comedie Francaise on board the vessel from
San Francisco, to declaim and prove the superior merits of
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