One of Our Conquerors - World eBook Library

George Meredith
Some day, we’ll hope, you will be sitting with us over a magnum
of Victor Radnor’s Romance Conti aged thirty-one: a
wine, you’ll say at the second glass, High Priest for the celebration
of the uncommon nuptials between the body and
the soul of man.’
‘You hit me rightly,’said Carting, tickled and touched; sensually
excited by the bouquet of Victor Radnor’s hospitality
and companionship, which added flavour to Fenellan’s compliments.
These came home to him through his desire to be
the ‘good spherical fellow’; for he, like modern diplomatists
in the track of their eminent Berlinese New Type of the time,
put on frankness as an armour over wariness, holding craft
in reserve: his aim was at the refreshment of honest fellowship:
by no means to discover that the coupling of his native
bias with his professional duty was unprofitable nowadays.
Wariness, however, was not somnolent, even when he said:
‘You know, I am never the lawyer out of my office. Man of
the world to men of the world; and I have not lost by it. I am
Mrs. Barman Radnor’s legal adviser: you are Mr. Victor
Radnor’s friend. They are, as we see them, not on the best of
terms. I would rather—at its lowest, as a matter of business—
be known for having helped them to some kind of footing
than send in a round bill to my client—or another. I gain
more in the end. Frankly, I mean to prove, that it’s a lawyer’s
interest to be human.’
‘Because, now, see!’ said Fenellan, ‘here’s the case. Miss
Natalia Dreighton, of a good Yorkshire family—a large one,
reads an advertisement for the post of companion to a lady,
and answers it, and engages herself, previous to the appearance
of the young husband. Miss Dreighton is one of the
finest young women alive. She has a glorious contralto voice.
Victor and she are encouraged by Mrs. Barman to sing duets
together. Well?
Why, Euclid would have theorem’d it out for you at a glance
at the trio. You have only to look on them, you chatter out
your three Acts of a Drama without a stop. If Mrs. Barman
cares to practise charity, she has only to hold in her Furyforked
tongue, or her Jarniman I think ‘s the name.’
Carting shrugged.
‘Let her keep from striking, if she’s Christian,’ pursued
Fenetlan, ‘and if kind let her resume the name of her first
lord, who did a better thing for himself than for her, when
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