The Minister of State: a novel

Front matter

1He\v 1Hovcl6 for mOcccrcvilf I'ricr (Is. each DREAMERS OF THE GHETTO By I. ZANGWILL THE LONDONERS Bv ROBERT HICHFNS THE WAR OF THE WORLDS Bv H. G. WELLS THE FOURTH NAPOLEON Bv CHARLES BENHAM THE TRIUMPH OF DEATH Bv GABRIELE D'ANNUNZIO THE MINISTER OF STATE Bv J. A. STEUART CLEO THE MAGNIFICENT Bv Z Z THE PHILHELLENES Bv H. N. BRAILS FORD THE LAKE OF WINE Bv BERNARD CAPES GOD'S FOUNDLING Bv A. J. DAWSON EZEKIEL'S SIN Bv J. A. PEARCE LONDON: WILLIAM HEINE&5&$*Mr%> 21 Bedford Street, WvC'v .. '-^.v KJ& ■ A Novel By John A. Steuart Author of "In the Day of Battle," " Kilgroom " fife. "That ivhich God ivrites on thy forehead thou 'wilt come to." The Koran London William Heinemann Copyright in the United States of America by J . A. Steuart All rights reserved To A. M. S. We wrote this story together; what it owes to your vigilance and judgment I know best, and it gratifies me to send it forth with your initials {if these must be all) un the fly-leaf.

A drama of romance in reality you have called it. Let the definition serve. The son of the heather descends into the midst of the city and the city hastens to make him her own ; and in her oxen way and time tests, as with fire, both him aud some linked to him — in bonds not to be shaken off. Through all the revolutions of fortune you watched over the personages of my history, tenderly solicitous for their well being, yet never forgetful of the touchstone, nor failing in the opportune word of counsel. To their good genius, there fore, this book is fittingly inscribed. J. A. S.

Book I

Chapter I

Much was expected of Evan, for he was ten, and had bed, board, and five half-crowns for the unremitting labour of nine months. And yet other appetising ingredients spiced his brimming cup. As often as Sunday came he was regaled, without thought of expense, on a pale ineffable infusion of tea-leaves thrice brewed, and half a barley scone nicely smeared with butter. At least once a quarter also his segment of fine bread bore a delicate suggestion of jam, as if ethereal fingers had stained it with a kind of crimson dew. But in reality the dainty conserve was spread by the fat hand of his aunt and mistress, expressly to produce that rapture of surprise, that gusto of soul and body which bountiful people love to witness in the objects of their affections. From such a pack of blessings fealty and gratitude might be expected to result as naturally as reaping follows sowing, were not nature for ever cynically deriding the natural.

So lively was Evan's feeling of obligation, that he gaily made requital by treat ing benefits and benefactors alike as opportune sport for the comic spirit, and, absorbed in the pursuit of amusement, forgot discretion. He had speedy reason to regret his merry irreverences. Benevo lence so tried is not eternal, and in this instance it failed suddenly. No more luxuries, no more pampering, cried the dis pensing power, bristling retributively. Those who had not the A grace to value good tea, and barley scone with butter and jam, could cool their blood on less dainty fare. So, in caustic recognition of his gifts, the satirist was put on porridge, potatoes, pease-bread, and broth, with a mid-day morsel of salt beef. Moreover, to digest the first fruits of his sarcasm he had sauce of the most piquant kind, that is to say, charges of flagrant neglect of duty, with threats of unmentionable vengeance if there were not prompt amendment.

Candour will not deny there was cause for complaint. An exacting and irascible employer who commits to your care fifteen head of depraved cattle is entitled to be wroth over breach of trust ; and Evan's defections were becoming intolerable. But how are you to subdue the lion's whelp to the docility and func tions of a watch dog? Neil Macgregor, on whom rested the double responsibility of master and uncle, was at his wits' end over the problem. In the heat of his musings he remembered many precepts and axioms bearing upon the correction of froward youth, Solomon's grim hint being among them ; and there were chastenings betimes. But it was a case of spoiling the rod with out bettering the child. The proof of improvement lies in conduct : you shall judge of Evan's. On the western side of Tullyven Burn, then a mere runnel at which the youngest calf would not boggle, was a neighbour's field of sweet turnips ; for this field the cows cherished a ravenous and ill-regulated passion, and divers matters, urgent beyond the com prehension of adults, engaged the boy's attention.

Sometimes he had to take the brag out of a rival herd who, coming with flouts and challenges, would depart with a streaming nose and a pair of black eyes ; sometimes to see that Tweed got fair play in a fight ; sometimes to maintain his supremacy in the great game of " jump the cuddy " ; again to chase squirrels, guddle trout, or dig out rabbits. For the present, however, his chief care was to save from waste the product of a raspberry thicket which flourished secretly and luxuriantly in the depths of an oak wood hard by. When the herd found it necessary to gather fruit the cows were under a similar compulsion to adjourn to the turnip-field, where they rioted with all the transports of the illicit, until some one did a little arduous hunting. A general reckoning invariably ensued. With the effective assistance of Tweed, his fidus Achates, and such stimulus to bovine virtue as a thick hazel coppice furnished, Evan took it out of the cows, to the great diminution of dairy produce ; and with the help of a supple switch Neil Macgregor in due course took it out ARCADIA 3 of Evan, to the grievous discomfort of bare legs.

These visitations commonly brought the transgressor an urgent thought to mend, to taste the tranquil joys of self-abnegation ; and he was always a model of propriety until fate again led him into temptation. Then the natural man had once more his fling. After all, time is more constant than chance. By a happy dispensation of Providence, one may repent in all weathers, in any season, but ripe rasps are fleeting mercies that must be seized as they are presented. So Evan went his way, and the cows went their way ; and retri bution followed delinquency as unfailingly as darkness overtakes light. Suddenly there came a crisis which crystallised flitting intentions into a fixed decision. Evan felt that the moment for bringing matters to a head was cruelly chosen, for the rasps were at their best ; and it was with bubblings of i-evolt and a burning conviction that the ways of the well-doer are indeed hard that he clenched his teeth for good courses.

As a means of overcoming the tempter he began to cut his name in big, deep, determined letters on the huge beech-tree in honour of which the pasture was called the beech-tree field. The giant crowned a height overlooking the seductive thicket, a height that was in some sort a Pisgah eminence, whence, if he cared, the martyr to duty could at least contemplate, if he durst not enter, the delectable land. He did not once look down, however, lest the sight should be too much for him. As he slashed and stabbed, with a very blunt knife and a very red face, all at once he was arrested by some one loudly calling his name. Turning quickly to see who had the temerity to interrupt him in his penance, he was confronted by two young ladies, whose manner was the reverse of timorous or apologetic. One was Miss Florence Dudley, an audacious young person with bare, plump, embrowned legs, flying, fluffy tangles of brown hair, a gauzy white frock, a gossamer pinafore, a bloomer or sun-bonnet of the dimen sions of an ordinary umbrella, and eyes that spoke several expres sive languages ; the other was Miss Dudley's maid, and Evan counted both as friends.

Miss Dudley was on the verge of her fifth birthday and had the imperious yet familiar manner proper to that mature age. An unwavering belief that the universe had been created for her exclusive pleasure inclined her to captivating airs of autocracy and occasional spurts of petulant impatience. Ignorant of Evan's resolution to tread the thorny paths of rectitude, she did not see why he should waste time whittling with an old knife. Accord ingly the unconventional greetings were hardly over when she ordered him to desist, put up his knife, and prove his capacity for better things by gathering her a capful of raspberries. This was assailing St. Anthony on his weakest side ; yet he had no thought of crying " A vaunt " ; for perhaps the most winning quality of a saint is his readiness to fall under adequate temptation.

Suspending his carving operations, Evan examined the chubby face and the aggressive eyes with a look at least as daunt less as their own. A giddy sense of privileged wickedness thrilled through all his members. Had Heaven sent him a fair excuse for breaking the Commandments ? It was unlike the ways of Heaven, but it might be true. Tingling with the thought, he noted that Miss Dudley's golden-brown curls, which reminded him of the sunlit ripples of a peat burn, were bewitchingly disordered, and his .esthetic feeling was gratified by bits of colour that shone in her dress — crimson ribbon deftly distributed in shoulder-bows, and a curiously knotted sash that was fairly ravishing. St. Anthony joyfully hugged the opportunity of being tempted by such a serpent. He was peremptorily called to attention by the question how long he intended to stand dallying.

Again he examined the questioner, deliberately, admiringly, and a little compassionately. An odd foreboding in the legs warned him to be cautious. On the whole it might be safest for St. Anthony to cry " Avaunt": there are times when even a saint must be politic. " They will not let me," he answered at length. " Den I will not love zoo any more," said Miss Dudley ; and behind the offended gleam of the eye was just a suspicion of moisture. The hesitating gallant flushed. What if she should cry on his hand ? Then a darker thought thrilled his heart, and his face burned. What if she should think him capable of faltering in his gallantry ? The idea was enough to screw his courage to any feat of rebellion. She stood regarding him with a pouted mouth and a con tracted brow, her short fat fingers twisting the sash so savagely that he felt as if his neck were being wrung.

Dare he venture upon forbidden things ? Lifting his eyes from the puckered face, the shoulder-knots, and the ravishing sash, he cast a prospecting look afield. It embraced the whole strathside, stretching upward in swift yet harmonious gradations of colour from the green of grass and infant crops to the shimmering purple of heather, the grey of granite cliff, and the cool, fathomless azure of the far horizon. The shining fields were dotted with labourers who appeared to be idly basking in the sun, so slight were their movements ARCADIA 5 Here and there a whitewashed building gleamed brilliantly and an occasional window flashed as if with living fire ; but the sparse farmsteads were mostly a sombre drab, with thatched roofs that did not glitter, and eaves and gables unknown to fashionable systems of architecture.

At least three burns were visible as dancing lines of light where their currents were not greatly vexed, or sparkling showers of foam as they "fell scattered down the rocks." Oak and fir plantations mottled the lower slopes ; over head, lifted to an unusual height, was a fleckless indigo sky, and the " eye of heaven " burned with a dazzling lustre. Pitweem, to which Evan owed the ill-appreciated mercies already enumerated, simmered in a shadowless heat, and Braeside, happier in having shade, slept a scarce breathing sleep under its straggling plane-trees. To Braeside belonged the enticing field of turnips ; and the tenant, Alexander Fraser, commonly known as Red Sandy from the general fieriness of hair and face, had been unpleasantly active of late in resenting the raids of his neighbour's cattle.

But Evan reckoned that, overcome by drowsi ness, he was just then probably snoring aloud in shirt sleeves and unloosed collar ; for Sandy being stout, maimed, elderly, and well to do, loved his mid-day nap. There was not a soul visible about Braeside to damp the ardour of chivalry. Closer at hand things were equally auspicious. The cows browsed virtuously and peacefully, knee deep in clover and buttercups, patterns of what respectable kine should be. Even Rosy, the one-horned vixen that took the van in thievish excursions, seemed to harbour no gluttonous designs upon the turnip field, while the great bull cropped his succulent mouthfuls with an air of innocence and content, as if this were indeed Paradise. Man and beast conspired to make sinning safe. Nevertheless, as no herd of experience would trust to appear ances, Tweed was sent out to give the cattle a disciplinary canter round the field.

They returned panting, their heads and tails in the air, their nostrils wide and red, their general mien truculent and resentful. Tweed trotted back to his master's heel, happy in a sense of duty well done : then telling the ladies to follow and mind their feet in the descent, Evan dropped down a long steep bank towards the raspberry thicket. Next minute, with dripping fingers and a complete forgetfulness of the past, he was pouring the luscious fruit into the outspread handkerchief of Florence, who rewarded him with smiles and rapturous exclamations. Time is man's most treacherous enemy. Evan could have taken his solemn oath on the big family Bible that he was not two minutes engaged in this knightly service, and that the cattle could not possibly have reached the turnip-field, even if they had made for it at the gallop, when he heard an ominous barking that made him pause and hold his breath.

" Gosh ! I'll get my licks now," he remarked with a flash of divination and a long breath of apprehension. " Never oo mind," said his youngest companion, whose face by this time was one daub of red, " Never oo mind. I'll div zoo a tiss and love zoo.'' She was prepared to redeem her promise on the instant, but before she could so much as purse her sanguinary little mouth Evan was tearing upward through a clump of hazels, calling loudly upon Tweed. Reaching the top in a state of palpitating excitement, he beheld his fifteen head of cattle disporting them selves riotously in the very centre of the turnip-field. Two un commonly active dogs were on their heels, the attack being directed by Red Sandy in person. Evan gazed for a moment breathless and speechless, then observed to himself very quietly that undoubtedly all the fat was in the fire this time.

Chapter II

There was, however, no dallying with regret. The cattle taking the burn at a plunge, like a drove in a panic — horns driving furiously, tails tossing like war-plumes in a charge — passed to such rewards as irate Justice provided with fangs and a hazel cudgel could most readily bestow. Tweed took flying heels in mouthfuls, and Evan, laying hold on the ringleader's tail, quickly reduced his staff to slivers on her iniquitous rump. That operation satisfactorily completed, he turned to look for Red Sandy, and was more surpi-ised than comforted to see that gentleman hobbling across the pasture at a gait that indicated anything but friendly intentions. At four hundred paces the signals of his wrath were unmistake able, and Evan, instinctively counting the blisters that remained since his last reckoning, wondered how man}- more the present settlement would mean.

For taking vengeance upon a light-footed herd with the resource of wide fields and steep braesides Red Sandy was rather seriously handicapped. One whole leg, a second eked out by a ARCADIA 7 wooden stump, and a crutch make a disheartening equipment of nether limbs. Such disabilities, indeed, would send the average man to an arm-chair, the chimney-cheek, and impotent grumbling. But Sandy was one of the rare spirits who are braced and spurred by disadvantages. You had but to tickle his dander as you might touch a spring in some devilish automaton to enjoy such an exhibition of energy as the best limbed man in the country-side could scarce have matched. His motive power being now at top most pressure, he was making uncanny speed, leg, stump, and crutch appearing to propel him by a species of unholy magic.

Evan gazed in fascination, a mark of attention which Red Sandy acknowledged by stopping at intervals to whirl his crutch about his head and then shake it truculently at the delinquent, as if to say : " You just be good enough to wait till I catch you, and the Lord have mercy on your hide ! " When presently Sandy drew near, his face purple, his eyes like points of fire, his nostrils like blow-pipes, his mouth full of curdling objurgations, and intimated a fixed determination to smash Evan's head to atoms, Evan judiciously retired. Thereupon Red Sandy putting on a spurt, as if to show how easily three legs could overhaul two, overbalanced and fell with a groan of fury. Scrambling back to the perpendicular with hideous contortions of the countenance and expletives that would look ill in print, he shook his crutch fiercely, vowing to let the culprit " have it," if the hunt should continue till the sound of the last trump.

Then once more plying his pins like a centipede, he advanced at the double, desiring Evan to wait and be pounded to jelly. Declining these overtures, Evan continued his retreat slowly and in good order, keeping perhaps fifty yards ahead of his pursuer This was wind and fuel to Red Sandy's fire. He paused a moment as if to consider ; then quick as thought he thrust out the stump sideways as a prop, reversed the crutch, and swinging it thrice round his head sent it whizzing at Evan with a petrifying male diction. It fell short of its mark, but Evan at least partially carried out its owner's purpose by springing nimbly and capturing it. Red Sandy's breath left him as if he had been wantonly punched in the pit of the stomach, and like our great grand parent on discovering the primary human trespass, he " amazed, astonied stood, and blank."

The blankness was but for an instant. Recovering himself with wondrous celerity, he informed Evan that if the crutch were retained another moment utter and complete annihilation would be mild compared to the tragedy that should be enacted. Evan studied the fuming Sandy with a feeling almost equally compounded of fear and amusement. The situation was unquestionably grave and the policy of aggravation perilous ; but with the enemy's chief weapon of offence in his possession he did not think of surrendering. So, like the ancient Phemius, he made bold to stand upon terms. On condition that not a word should be said to anybody about the unlucky business in hand the crutch would be restored ; otherwise it would be retained. It would profit nothing to chaffer, to make indefinite promises or suggest alternatives.

And there was the utmost necessity for being prompt in reply. Only a special dispensation of Providence saved Sandy from a fit. Did he hear aright, or was this astounding thing a dream ? The answer must have come with the swiftness of lightning, for plumping upon the ground he began with desperate fingers to unbuckle his wooden leg. It was off in a trice and singing, like a bolt from a bow, in a straight course for Evan's head. After it there went a venomous hiss as of a serpent striking. Evan dodged, the projectile reached earth, was seized and held beside the crutch. Then the captor turned to look upon the helpless and frantic foe, and was cursed, body and soul, till his spine crawled. " Give me pack my sticks," bellowed Sandy. " Gott tam ! I will proke effery pone in your tirty pody too."

At close quarters Evan's courage might have failed, but at a distance of fifty yards the fury of the crippled dragon seemed bearable. " I'll give you back your sticks if you promise not to tell on me," was the astute response. Red Sandy ground his teeth as if his antagonist were between them. Let him just get his claws upon the imp of Satan ! Ach ! the young teffle ! Oblivious of his condition, oblivious of everything save the object of his chase, Red Sandy tried to hop on one leg, and was rewarded by a mocking peal of laughter. Drawing up abruptly and balancing himself, he endeavoured to express his sentiments ; but the thing was beyond words. So he instinctively looked for a stone to brain the brat on the spot. Fate, however, was tan talising and unkind. In searching he had to stoop ; haste and a passion for revenge made him bend rashly, the law of gravitation took him at a disadvantage, and in short, before his hand found a missile his nose was thrilling from violent impact with the earth.

The shock brought sudden tears to Sandy's eyes and an oath of gruesome cogency to Sandy's tongue. It likewise caused him ARCADIA 9 to take his most prominent feature feelingly in his hand as if trying to discover whether it were shapeless pulp or merely hopelessly askew. Nursing it, he relieved himself by a fresh intimation of his intentions ; then, ardour mastering pain, he set about rising as if deficiency of limbs were rather a help than a hindrance in an emergency. But again ill luck was upon him. Just as he was on the point of succeeding he swayed unexpectedly, recovered with a jerk, tilted to the other side, swung half round, and, poising for half an instant on the heel of his single foot like a too venturesome acrobat, rolled incontinently on his back. TJnder different circumstances the spectacle of a fat man floundering like a dolphin turned upside down might have been comical, but just then its effect was to make the solitary witness shiver in the summer heat.

Sandy renewed his efforts to rise, and presently, after a mighty struggle that left him gasping and vermilion, he gained a sitting posture. The sweat stood in pearls on his face, his nose — his poor, bruised carnelian nose — sent forth rivulets of snuff, which, describing a dark circle about his mouth, dropped providently from his chin upon his shirt front, and the veins on the top of his bald head reminded the observant Evan of a collection of tiny black-puddings. He mopped himself with a big bandana hand kerchief, smearing cheeks and crown in his attempts to dam the flowing nostrils and press down the swollen veins. Then the two looked at each other, steadily and speechlessly, for the space of a minute. The whole creation seemed to pause to listen and watch, so intense and electric was the silence.

Evan was deafened by the drumming of pulses in his ears and frightened by the quick, hard beat of his own heart. All at once Red Sandy spoke, and his voice had the startling detonation of an exploding bomb. Perdition ! he wanted back his crutch and leg. Did the young teffle hear? With a dry mouth and icy tremors the young teffle repeated the terms of peace : he marvelled at his own audacity while the words were leaving his lips, yet he had no thought of surrendering the captured implements of war. It seemed as if Red Sandy were going off in spontaneous com bustion. But as Evan waited, breathless, for the blue flame, there came a swift and miraculous change. The hurricane of malisons ceased, the dusky-red glow faded from Sandy's face, his eyes beamed ; one might have fancied he was actually trying to smile.

As a matter of fact he was making the attempt, though it was not immediately successful. " Do you know what I will pe thinking, Evan ? " he inquired, bending forward in a confidential attitude ; " i will pe thinking what will the neighbours say if they see this ploy ? " Opening his eyes, as if to intimate he was perfectly wide awake, Evan answered that in all probability they would laugh and indulge in irreverent remarks; that the story would be blown abroad, would travel and be magnified. " I will just pe thinking that," purred Sandy. " It will not pe goot for you, and it will not pe goot for me. Fuich, fuich, no ! Old fools are the worst fools, except young fools ; but you and me will just pe keeping things to ourselves." His right eye closed, and he cackled knowingly. " I see thae two Sassenach clypes coming," he went on in dulcet tones ; " Sassenachs will have gey long tongues ; ay, and gey tirty ones, too, whatever.

But never you mind, Evan, my latt ; we'll pe up to them. They have no pissiness to be keeking to the pottom of other people's wells too ; sacrets iss sacrets. You'll just pe giving me pack my pits of sticks, Evan, and help ing me on with that leg, and then the pull of your hand ; and let long-tongued folk whistle. When a man like me sits down it will not pe fery eassy for him to rise too." A backward glance during this speech showed Evan the cause of his own trouble and Sandy's sweetness approaching at a pace that clearly signified an interest in the proceedings. Florence, being the fleeter of foot, had outrun her nurse, and in another minute would be upon them. " Now, Evan," pursued Sandy, in his most caressing accents, " just come with the pits of sticks, and puckle the straps for me. Your soople fingers will do it petter than mine."

And Evan, gazing in amusement, thought that in vain does the fowler spread the net in the sight of any bird. " You will pe thinking I want to catch you," cooed Sandy, '• but teet no, Evan. I wass just wanting some fun this hot day, am] I will have it. Ay, ay, more than wass in the pargain, a thousant times more. Now, like a goot boy, give me my pits of sticks. Just see," he exclaimed, with a note of alarm, " how fast that little cuttie will pe now." "If I give you back your sticks will you promise?" inquired Evan, whose courage grew as the other's waned. ' ' What else ? " answered Sandy, with his eyes on the advanc ing pair. " To pe shure, to pe shure. Pe fast, Evan. You're a goot poy, and a defer poy, and if you will let the cows into the neeps, what's that ? Fuich ! nothing at all. I will do the same myself, onct, two hunner times — hooch, ay, two thoosant times and more."

ARCADIA 11 Relenting a little under these compliments and assurances, Evan advanced to within perhaps five yards of the pleading Sandy, and set down the leg and crutch. "There, now you can creep and get them," he said, stepping back to avoid accidents, " and then you can rise easy enough." " Put them a wee pittie nearer, Evan," coaxed Sandy. " A wee, wee pittie. I will pe gey and pad at the creeping too." Evan pushed the leg and crutch a yard or two nearer their owner, with an intimation that he would put them no farther, and Sandy, convinced of the folly of pleading, meekly began to crawl towards his timbers. But before his trembling hands were upon them Florence bounded up with flushed face, flying hair and hat, and a manner full of pity and concern. " Poor old man," she cried at sight of the creeping Sandy, " is oo hurt or is oo one leg too tired to walk ?

" Sandy groaned instead of answering. This was more than flesh and blood could endure ; and as certainly as the just are permitted to take vengeance upon their enemies, some one should suffer. But the scowl that darkened his face was but as a fleeting shadow upon a lake. The next instant he had clapped an extinguisher upou his anger, and was laughing as boisterously with Florence as if merriment were the sole aim of his existence. He told her what fun he had had with his goot friend Evan in consequence of the frolic of the cows among the turnips, that in sport nothing in the world served a man like a crutch, and was ready to wager his head he alone among her friends was blessed with a leg that could be put off or on at plea sure. But when she suggested he should give another exhibition of his skill in creeping and rising he had regretfully to tear him self away to keep an engagement elsewhere.

Scarcely had he turned his back when Evan, in whom the devil of mimicry was strong, proceeded to rehearse the scene with the leg and crutch so vividly and ludicrously that Florence clapped her hands and shouted for glee, and the maid laughed till she cried. Hearing the peals of laughter, Red Sandy turned once as if to say to the performer, " That is exceedingly handsome of you. Well ! persevere, and Heaven help you when I come to repay the kindness." But the Parthian arrow did not interrupt the progress of the farce, nor, when it was over and Florence was tripping away as lightly as if sorrow had never entered the world, did Evan once think of blaming her for having created an equivocal situation.