Sir George Tressady, vol 2 | Page 4

It seems impossible, unfitting,
to grant to such persons le beau rôle they claim. It outrages a certain
ideal instinct, even, to be asked to believe that they too can yield, in
their measure, precisely the same tragic stuff as the hero or the saint.
Letty was at home, just about to share her lunch with Harding Watton,
who had dropped in. Hearing her husband's voice, she came out to the
stairhead to speak to him.
But after a minute or two George dashed down again to his study, that
he might write a hurried note to a middle-aged cousin of his mother's,
asking her to go round to Warwick Square early in the afternoon, and
making excuses for Letty, who was "very much engaged."
For Letty had met his request with a smiling disdain. Why, she was
simply "crowded up" with engagements of all sorts and kinds!
"Mother is really unwell," said George, standing with his hands on his
sides, looking down upon her. He was fuming with irritation and hurry,
and had to put a force on himself to speak persuasively.
"My dear old boy!"--she rose on tiptoe and twisted his moustache for
him--"don't we know all about your mother's ailments by this time? I
suppose she wants to give me a scolding, or to hear about the Ardaghs,
or to tell me all about the smart parties she has been to--or something of
the sort. No, really, it's quite impossible--this afternoon. I know I must
go and see her some time--of course I will."
She said this with the air of someone making a great concession. It was,
indeed, her first formal condonement of the offence offered her just

before the Castle Luton visit.
George attempted a little more argument and entreaty, but in vain.
Letty was rather puzzled by his urgency, but quite obdurate. And as he
ran down the stairs, he heard her laugh in the drawing-room mingled
with Harding Watton's. No doubt they were making merry over the
"discipline" which Letty found it necessary to apply to her
mother-in-law.
In the House of Commons the afternoon was once more given up to the
adjourned debate on the second reading of the Maxwell Bill. The
House was full, and showing itself to advantage. On the whole, the
animation and competence of the speeches reflected the general rise in
combative energy and the wide kindling of social passions which the
Bill had so far brought about, both in and out of Parliament. Those who
figured as the defenders of industries harassed beyond bearing by the
Socialist meddlers spoke with more fire, with more semblance, at any
rate, of putting their hearts into it than any men of their kind had been
able to attain since the "giant" days of the first Factory debates. Those,
on the other hand, who were urging the House to a yet sterner vigilance
in protecting the worker--even the grown man--from his own
helplessness and need, who believed that law spells freedom, and that
the experience of half a century was wholly on their side--these friends
of a strong cause were also at their best, on their mettle. Owing to the
widespread flow of a great reaction, the fight had become a
representative contest between two liberties--a true battle of ideas.
Yet George, sitting below the Gangway beside his leader, his eyes
staring at the ceiling, and his hands in his pockets, listened to it all in
much languor and revolt. He himself had made his speech on the third
day of the debate. It had cost him endless labour, only to seem to him
in the end--by contrast with the vast majority of speeches made in the
course of the debate, even those by men clearly inferior to himself in
mind and training--to be a hollow and hypocritical performance. What
did he really think and believe? What did he really desire? He vowed to
himself once more, as he had vowed at Ferth, that his mind was a chaos,
without convictions, either intellectual or moral; that he had begun

what he was not able to finish; and that he was doomed to make a
failure of his parliamentary career, as he was already making a failure
of coal-owning and a failure--
He curbed something bitter and springing that haunted his most inmost
mind. But his effort could not prevent his dwelling angrily for a minute
on the thought of Letty laughing with Harding Watton--laughing
because he had asked her a small kindness, and she had most unkindly
refused it.
Yet she must help him with his poor mother. How softened were all his
thoughts about that difficult and troublesome lady! As it happened, he
had a good deal of desultory medical knowledge, for the problems and
perils of the body had always attracted