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Chapter II

ON the first of December, Mrs. Lee took the train for Washington, and
before five o'clock that evening she was entering her newly hired
house on Lafayette Square. She shrugged her shoulders with a mingled
expression of contempt and grief at the curious barbarism of the
curtains and the wall-papers, and her next two days were occupied with
a life-and-death struggle to get the mastery over her surroundings. In
this awful contest the interior of the doomed house suffered as though
a demon were in it; not a chair, not a mirror, not a carpet, was left
untouched, and in the midst of the worst confusion the new mistress sat,
calm as the statue of Andrew Jackson in the square under her eyes, and
issued her orders with as much decision as that hero had ever shown.
Towards the close of the second day, victory crowned her forehead. A
new era, a nobler conception of duty and existence, had dawned upon
that benighted and heathen residence. The wealth of Syria and Persia was
poured out upon the melancholy Wilton carpets; embroidered comets and
woven gold from Japan and Teheran depended from and covered over every
sad stuff-curtain; a strange medley of sketches, paintings, fans,
embroideries, and porcelain was hung, nailed, pinned, or stuck against
the wall; finally the domestic altarpiece, the mystical Corot landscape,
was hoisted to its place over the parlour fire, and then all was over.
The setting sun streamed softly in at the windows, and peace reigned in
that redeemed house and in the heart of its mistress.

“I think it will do now, Sybil,” said she, surveying the scene.

“It must,” replied Sybil. “You haven't a plate or a fan or coloured
scarf left. You must send out and buy some of these old negro-women's
bandannas if you are going to cover anything else. What is the use? Do
you suppose any human being in Washington will like it? They will think
you demented.”

“There is such a thing as self-respect,” replied her sister, calmly.

Sybil--Miss Sybil Ross--was Madeleine Lee's sister. The keenest
psychologist could not have detected a single feature quality which they
had in common, and for that reason they were devoted friends. Madeleine
was thirty, Sybil twenty-four. Madeleine was indescribable; Sybil was
transparent. Madeleine was of medium height with a graceful figure,
a well-set head, and enough golden-brown hair to frame a face full of
varying expression. Her eyes were never for two consecutive hours of the
same shade, but were more often blue than grey. People who envied her
smile said that she cultivated a sense of humour in order to show her
teeth. Perhaps they were right; but there was no doubt that her habit
of talking with gesticulation would never have grown upon her unless
she had known that her hands were not only beautiful but expressive.
She dressed as skilfully as New York women do, but in growing older
she began to show symptoms of dangerous unconventionality. She had been
heard to express a low opinion of her countrywomen who blindly fell down
before the golden calf of Mr. Worth, and she had even fought a battle
of great severity, while it lasted, with one of her best-dressed
friends who had been invited--and had gone--to Mr. Worth's afternoon
tea-parties. The secret was that Mrs. Lee had artistic tendencies, and
unless they were checked in time, there was no knowing what might be
the consequence. But as yet they had done no harm; indeed, they rather
helped to give her that sort of atmosphere which belongs only to certain
women; as indescribable as the afterglow; as impalpable as an Indian
summer mist; and non-existent except to people who feel rather than
reason. Sybil had none of it. The imagination gave up all attempts
to soar where she came. A more straightforward, downright, gay,
sympathetic, shallow, warm-hearted, sternly practical young woman has
rarely touched this planet. Her mind had room for neither grave-stones
nor guide-books; she could not have lived in the past or the future if
she had spent her days in churches and her nights in tombs. “She was
not clever, like Madeleine, thank Heaven.” Madeleine was not an orthodox
member of the church; sermons bored her, and clergymen never failed to
irritate every nerve in her excitable system. Sybil was a simple and
devout worshipper at the ritualistic altar; she bent humbly before the
Paulist fathers. When she went to a ball she always had the best partner
in the room, and took it as a matter of course; but then, she always
prayed for one; somehow it strengthened her faith. Her sister took care
never to laugh at her on this score, or to shock her religious opinions.
“Time enough,” said she, “for her to forget religion when religion
fails her.” As for regular attendance at church, Madeleine was able to
reconcile their habits without trouble. She herself had not entered a
church for years; she said it gave her unchristian feelings; but Sybil
had a voice of excellent quality, well trained and cultivated:
Madeleine insisted that she should sing in the choir, and by this
little manoeuvre, the divergence of their paths was made less evident.
Madeleine did not sing, and therefore could not go to church with Sybil.
This outrageous fallacy seemed perfectly to answer its purpose, and
Sybil accepted it, in good faith, as a fair working principle which
explained itself.

Madeleine was sober in her tastes. She wasted no money. She made no
display.

She walked rather than drove, and wore neither diamonds nor brocades.
But the general impression she made was nevertheless one of luxury. On
the other hand, her sister had her dresses from Paris, and wore them
and her ornaments according to all the formulas; she was good-naturedly
correct, and bent her round white shoulders to whatever burden the
Parisian autocrat chose to put upon them. Madeleine never interfered,
and always paid the bills.

Before they had been ten days in Washington, they fell gently into their
place and were carried along without an effort on the stream of social
life.

Society was kind; there was no reason for its being otherwise. Mrs. Lee
and her sister had no enemies, held no offices, and did their best to
make themselves popular. Sybil had not passed summers at Newport and
winters in New York in vain; and neither her face nor her figure, her
voice nor her dancing, needed apology. Politics were not her strong
point. She was induced to go once to the Capitol and to sit ten minutes
in the gallery of the Senate. No one ever knew what her impressions
were; with feminine tact she managed not to betray herself But, in
truth, her notion of legislative bodies was vague, floating between her
experience at church and at the opera, so that the idea of a performance
of some kind was never out of her head. To her mind the Senate was a
place where people went to recite speeches, and she naively assumed that
the speeches were useful and had a purpose, but as they did not interest
her she never went again. This is a very common conception of Congress;
many Congressmen share it.

Her sister was more patient and bolder. She went to the Capitol nearly
every day for at least two weeks. At the end of that time her interest
began to flag, and she thought it better to read the debates every
morning in the Congressional Record. Finding this a laborious and not
always an instructive task, she began to skip the dull parts; and in
the absence of any exciting question, she at last resigned herself
to skipping the whole. Nevertheless she still had energy to visit the
Senate gallery occasionally when she was told that a splendid orator
was about to speak on a question of deep interest to his country.
She listened with a little disposition to admire, if she could; and,
whenever she could, she did admire. She said nothing, but she listened
sharply. She wanted to learn how the machinery of government worked,
and what was the quality of the men who controlled it. One by one, she
passed them through her crucibles, and tested them by acids and by fire.

A few survived her tests and came out alive, though more or less
disfigured, where she had found impurities. Of the whole number, only
one retained under this process enough character to interest her.

In these early visits to Congress, Mrs. Lee sometimes had the company
of John Carrington, a Washington lawyer about forty years old, who, by
virtue of being a Virginian and a distant connection of her husband,
called himself a cousin, and took a tone of semi-intimacy, which Mrs.
Lee accepted because Carrington was a man whom she liked, and because
he was one whom life had treated hardly. He was of that unfortunate
generation in the south which began existence with civil war, and he was
perhaps the more unfortunate because, like most educated Virginians of
the old Washington school, he had seen from the first that, whatever
issue the war took, Virginia and he must be ruined. At twenty-two he had
gone into the rebel army as a private and carried his musket modestly
through a campaign or two, after which he slowly rose to the rank of
senior captain in his regiment, and closed his services on the staff of
a major-general, always doing scrupulously enough what he conceived to
be his duty, and never doing it with enthusiasm. When the rebel armies
surrendered, he rode away to his family plantation--not a difficult
thing to do, for it was only a few miles from Appomatox--and at once
began to study law; then, leaving his mother and sisters to do what
they could with the worn-out plantation, he began the practice of law
in Washington, hoping thus to support himself and them. He had succeeded
after a fashion, and for the first time the future seemed not absolutely
dark. Mrs. Lee's house was an oasis to him, and he found himself, to
his surprise, almost gay in her company. The gaiety was of a very quiet
kind, and Sybil, while friendly with him, averred that he was certainly
dull; but this dulness had a fascination for Madeleine, who, having
tasted many more kinds of the wine of life than Sybil, had learned to
value certain delicacies of age and flavour that were lost upon younger
and coarser palates. He talked rather slowly and almost with effort, but
he had something of the dignity--others call it stiffness--of the
old Virginia school, and twenty years of constant responsibility
and deferred hope had added a touch of care that bordered closely on
sadness. His great attraction was that he never talked or seemed to
think of himself. Mrs. Lee trusted in him by instinct. “He is a type!”
 said she; “he is my idea of George Washington at thirty.”

One morning in December, Carrington entered Mrs. Lee's parlour towards
noon, and asked if she cared to visit the Capitol.

“You will have a chance of hearing to-day what may be the last great
speech of our greatest statesman,” said he; “you should come.”

“A splendid sample of our native raw material, sir?” asked she,
fresh from a reading of Dickens, and his famous picture of American
statesmanship.

“Precisely so,” said Carrington; “the Prairie Giant of Peonia, the
Favourite Son of Illinois; the man who came within three votes of
getting the party nomination for the Presidency last spring, and was
only defeated because ten small intriguers are sharper than one big one.
The Honourable Silas P. Ratcliffe, Senator from Illinois; he will be run
for the Presidency yet.”

“What does the P. stand for?” asked Sybil.

“I don't remember ever to have heard his middle name,” said Carrington.

“Perhaps it is Peonia or Prairie; I can't say.”

“He is the man whose appearance struck me so much when we were in the
Senate last week, is he not? A great, ponderous man, over six feet
high, very senatorial and dignified, with a large head and rather good
features?” inquired Mrs. Lee.

“The same,” replied Carrington. “By all means hear him speak. He is
the stumbling-block of the new President, who is to be allowed no peace
unless he makes terms with Ratcliffe; and so every one thinks that the
Prairie Giant of Peonia will have the choice of the State or Treasury
Department. If he takes either it will be the Treasury, for he is a
desperate political manager, and will want the patronage for the next
national convention.”

Mrs. Lee was delighted to hear the debate, and Carrington was delighted
to sit through it by her side, and to exchange running comments with her
on the speeches and the speakers.

“Have you ever met the Senator?” asked she.

“I have acted several times as counsel before his committees. He is an
excellent chairman, always attentive and generally civil.”

“Where was he born?”

“The family is a New England one, and I believe respectable. He came, I
think, from some place in the Connecticut Valley, but whether Vermont,
New Hampshire, or Massachusetts, I don't know.”

“Is he an educated man?”

“He got a kind of classical education at one of the country colleges
there. I suspect he has as much education as is good for him. But he
went West very soon after leaving college, and being then young and
fresh from that hot-bed of abolition, he threw himself into the
anti-slavery movement in Illinois, and after a long struggle he rose
with the wave. He would not do the same thing now.”

“Why not?”

“He is older, more experienced, and not so wise. Besides, he has no
longer the time to wait. Can you see his eyes from here? I call them
Yankee eyes.”

“Don't abuse the Yankees,” said Mrs. Lee; “I am half Yankee myself.”

“Is that abuse? Do you mean to deny that they have eyes?”

“I concede that there may be eyes among them; but Virginians are not
fair judges of their expression.”

“Cold eyes,” he continued; “steel grey, rather small, not unpleasant in
good-humour, diabolic in a passion, but worst when a little suspicious;
then they watch you as though you were a young rattle-snake, to be
killed when convenient.”

“Does he not look you in the face?”

“Yes; but not as though he liked you. His eyes only seem to ask the
possible uses you might be put to. Ah, the vice-president has given him
the floor; now we shall have it. Hard voice, is it not? like his eyes.
Hard manner, like his voice. Hard all through.”

“What a pity he is so dreadfully senatorial!” said Mrs. Lee; “otherwise
I rather admire him.”

“Now he is settling down to his work,” continued Carrington. “See how he
dodges all the sharp issues. What a thing it is to be a Yankee! What a
genius the fellow has for leading a party! Do you see how well it is all
done? The new President flattered and conciliated, the party united and
given a strong lead. And now we shall see how the President will deal
with him. Ten to one on Ratcliffe. Come, there is that stupid ass from
Missouri getting up. Let us go.”

As they passed down the steps and out into the Avenue, Mrs. Lee turned
to Carrington as though she had been reflecting deeply and had at length
reached a decision.

“Mr. Carrington,” said she, “I want to know Senator Ratcliffe.”

“You will meet him to-morrow evening,” replied Carrington, “at your
senatorial dinner.”

The Senator from New York, the Honourable Schuyler Clinton, was an old
admirer of Mrs. Lee, and his wife was a cousin of hers, more or less
distant. They had lost no time in honouring the letter of credit she
thus had upon them, and invited her and her sister to a solemn dinner,
as imposing as political dignity could make it. Mr. Carrington, as a
connection of hers, was one of the party, and almost the only one among
the twenty persons at table who had neither an office, nor a title, nor
a constituency.

Senator Clinton received Mrs. Lee and her sister with tender enthusiasm,
for they were attractive specimens of his constituents. He pressed their
hands and evidently restrained himself only by an effort from embracing
them, for the Senator had a marked regard for pretty women, and had made
love to every girl with any pretensions to beauty that had appeared
in the State of New York for fully half a century. At the same time
he whispered an apology in her ear; he regretted so much that he was
obliged to forego the pleasure of taking her to dinner; Washington was
the only city in America where this could have happened, but it was a
fact that ladies here were very great stickiers for etiquette; on the
other hand he had the sad consolation that she would be the gainer,
for he had allotted to her Lord Skye, the British Minister, “a most
agreeable man and not married, as I have the misfortune to be;” and on
the other side “I have ventured to place Senator Ratcliffe, of Illinois,
whose admirable speech I saw you listening to with such rapt attention
yesterday. I thought you might like to know him. Did I do right?”

Madeleine assured him that he had divined her inmost wishes, and he
turned with even more warmth of affection to her sister: “As for you, my
dear--dear Sybil, what can I do to make your dinner agreeable? If I give
your sister a coronet, I am only sorry not to have a diadem for you. But
I have done everything in my power. The first Secretary of the Russian
Legation, Count Popoff, will take you in; a charming young man, my dear
Sybil; and on your other side I have placed the Assistant Secretary of
State, whom you know.”

And so, after the due delay, the party settled themselves at the
dinner-table, and Mrs. Lee found Senator Ratcliffe's grey eyes resting
on her face for a moment as they sat down.

Lord Skye was very agreeable, and, at almost any other moment of her
life, Mrs. Lee would have liked nothing better than to talk with him
from the beginning to the end of her dinner. Tall, slender, bald-headed,
awkward, and stammering with his elaborate British stammer whenever it
suited his convenience to do so; a sharp observer who had wit which he
commonly concealed; a humourist who was satisfied to laugh silently at
his own humour; a diplomatist who used the mask of frankness with great
effect; Lord Skye was one of the most popular men in Washington. Every
one knew that he was a ruthless critic of American manners, but he had
the art to combine ridicule with good-humour, and he was all the more
popular accordingly. He was an outspoken admirer of American women
in everything except their voices, and he did not even shrink from
occasionally quizzing a little the national peculiarities of his own
countrywomen; a sure piece of flattery to their American cousins. He
would gladly have devoted himself to Mrs. Lee, but decent civility
required that he should pay some attention to his hostess, and he was
too good a diplomatist not to be attentive to a hostess who was the wife
of a Senator, and that Senator the chairman of the committee of foreign
relations.

The moment his head was turned, Mrs. Lee dashed at her Peonia Giant, who
was then consuming his fish, and wishing he understood why the British
Minister had worn no gloves, while he himself had sacrificed his
convictions by wearing the largest and whitest pair of French kids that
could be bought for money on Pennsylvania Avenue. There was a little
touch of mortification in the idea that he was not quite at home among
fashionable people, and at this instant he felt that true happiness was
only to be found among the simple and honest sons and daughters of toil.
A certain secret jealousy of the British Minister is always lurking in
the breast of every American Senator, if he is truly democratic; for
democracy, rightly understood, is the government of the people, by the
people, for the benefit of Senators, and there is always a danger that
the British Minister may not understand this political principle as he
should. Lord Skye had run the risk of making two blunders; of offending
the Senator from New York by neglecting his wife, and the Senator from
Illinois by engrossing the attention of Mrs. Lee. A young Englishman
would have done both, but Lord Skye had studied the American
constitution. The wife of the Senator from New York now thought him most
agreeable, and at the same moment the Senator from Illinois awoke to the
conviction that after all, even in frivolous and fashionable circles,
true dignity is in no danger of neglect; an American Senator
represents a sovereign state; the great state of Illinois is as big
as England--with the convenient omission of Wales, Scotland, Ireland,
Canada, India, Australia, and a few other continents and islands; and in
short, it was perfectly clear that Lord Skye was not formidable to him,
even in light society; had not Mrs. Lee herself as good as said that no
position equalled that of an American Senator?

In ten minutes Mrs. Lee had this devoted statesman at her feet. She had
not studied the Senate without a purpose. She had read with unerring
instinct one general characteristic of all Senators, a boundless
and guileless thirst for flattery, engendered by daily draughts from
political friends or dependents, then becoming a necessity like a dram,
and swallowed with a heavy smile of ineffable content. A single glance
at Mr. Ratcliffe's face showed Madeleine that she need not be afraid
of flattering too grossly; her own self-respect, not his, was the only
restraint upon her use of this feminine bait.

She opened upon him with an apparent simplicity and gravity, a quiet
repose of manner, and an evident consciousness of her own strength,
which meant that she was most dangerous.

“I heard your speech yesterday, Mr. Ratcliffe. I am glad to have a
chance of telling you how much I was impressed by it. It seemed to me
masterly. Do you not find that it has had a great effect?”

“I thank you, madam. I hope it will help to unite the party, but as yet
we have had no time to measure its results. That will require several
days more.” The Senator spoke in his senatorial manner, elaborate,
condescending, and a little on his guard.

“Do you know,” said Mrs. Lee, turning towards him as though he were a
valued friend, and looking deep into his eyes, “Do you know that every
one told me I should be shocked by the falling off in political ability
at Washington? I did not believe them, and since hearing your speech I
am sure they are mistaken. Do you yourself think there is less ability
in Congress than there used to be?”

“Well, madam, it is difficult to answer that question. Government is not
so easy now as it was formerly. There are different customs. There are
many men of fair abilities in public life; many more than there used to
be; and there is sharper criticism and more of it.”

“Was I right in thinking that you have a strong resemblance to Daniel
Webster in your way of speaking? You come from the same neighbourhood,
do you not?”

Mrs. Lee here hit on Ratcliffe's weak point; the outline of his head
had, in fact, a certain resemblance to that of Webster, and he prided
himself upon it, and on a distant relationship to the Expounder of the
Constitution; he began to think that Mrs. Lee was a very intelligent
person. His modest admission of the resemblance gave her the opportunity
to talk of Webster's oratory, and the conversation soon spread to a
discussion of the merits of Clay and Calhoun. The Senator found that his
neighbour--a fashionable New York woman, exquisitely dressed, and with
a voice and manner seductively soft and gentle--had read the speeches of
Webster and Calhoun. She did not think it necessary to tell him that she
had persuaded the honest Carrington to bring her the volumes and to mark
such passages as were worth her reading; but she took care to lead the
conversation, and she criticised with some skill and more humour the
weak points in Websterian oratory, saying with a little laugh and a
glance into his delighted eyes:

“My judgment may not be worth much, Mr. Senator, but it does seem to me
that our fathers thought too much of themselves, and till you teach
me better I shall continue to think that the passage in your speech
of yesterday which began with, 'Our strength lies in this twisted and
tangled mass of isolated principles, the hair of the half-sleeping giant
of Party,' is both for language and imagery quite equal to anything of
Webster's.”

The Senator from Illinois rose to this gaudy fly like a huge,
two-hundred-pound salmon; his white waistcoat gave out a mild silver
reflection as he slowly came to the surface and gorged the hook. He made
not even a plunge, not one perceptible effort to tear out the barbed
weapon, but, floating gently to her feet, allowed himself to be landed
as though it were a pleasure. Only miserable casuists will ask whether
this was fair play on Madeleine's part; whether flattery so gross
cost her conscience no twinge, and whether any woman can without
self-abasement be guilty of such shameless falsehood. She, however,
scorned the idea of falsehood. She would have defended herself by saying
that she had not so much praised Ratcliffe as depreciated Webster,
and that she was honest in her opinion of the old-fashioned American
oratory. But she could not deny that she had wilfully allowed the
Senator to draw conclusions very different from any she actually held.
She could not deny that she had intended to flatter him to the extent
necessary for her purpose, and that she was pleased at her success.
Before they rose from table the Senator had quite unbent himself; he
was talking naturally, shrewdly, and with some humour; he had told her
Illinois stories; spoken with extraordinary freedom about his political
situation; and expressed the wish to call upon Mrs. Lee, if he could
ever hope to find her at home.

“I am always at home on Sunday evenings,” said she.

To her eyes he was the high-priest of American politics; he was charged
with the meaning of the mysteries, the clue to political hieroglyphics.
Through him she hoped to sound the depths of statesmanship and to
bring up from its oozy bed that pearl of which she was in search; the
mysterious gem which must lie hidden somewhere in politics. She wanted
to understand this man; to turn him inside out; to experiment on him and
use him as young physiologists use frogs and kittens. If there was good
or bad in him, she meant to find its meaning.

And he was a western widower of fifty; his quarters in Washington were
in gaunt boarding-house rooms, furnished only with public documents and
enlivened by western politicians and office-seekers. In the summer he
retired to a solitary, white framehouse with green blinds, surrounded
by a few feet of uncared-for grass and a white fence; its interior more
dreary still, with iron stoves, oil-cloth carpets, cold white walls, and
one large engraving of Abraham Lincoln in the parlour; all in Peonia,
Illinois! What equality was there between these two combatants? what
hope for him? what risk for her? And yet Madeleine Lee had fully her
match in Mr. Silas P. Ratcliffe.



Chapter III

MRS. Lee soon became popular. Her parlour was a favourite haunt of
certain men and women who had the art of finding its mistress at home;
an art which seemed not to be within the powers of everybody. Carrington
was apt to be there more often than any one else, so that he was looked
on as almost a part of the family, and if Madeleine wanted a book from
the library, or an extra man at her dinner-table, Carrington was pretty
certain to help her to the one or the other. Old Baron Jacobi, the
Bulgarian minister, fell madly in love with both sisters, as he commonly
did with every pretty face and neat figure. He was a witty, cynical,
broken-down Parisian rou;, kept in Washington for years past by his
debts and his salary; always grumbling because there was no opera, and
mysteriously disappearing on visits to New York; a voracious devourer of
French and German literature, especially of novels; a man who seemed to
have met every noted or notorious personage of the century, and whose
mind was a magazine of amusing information; an excellent musical critic,
who was not afraid to criticise Sybil's singing; a connoisseur in
bric-;-brac, who laughed at Madeleine's display of odds and ends, and
occasionally brought her a Persian plate or a bit of embroidery, which
he said was good and would do her credit. This old sinner believed in
everything that was perverse and wicked, but he accepted the prejudices
of Anglo-Saxon society, and was too clever to obtrude his opinions upon
others.

He would have married both sisters at once more willingly than either
alone, but as he feelingly said, “If I were forty years younger,
mademoiselle, you should not sing to me so calmly.” His friend
Popoff, an intelligent, vivacious Russian, with very Calmuck features,
susceptible as a girl, and passionately fond of music, hung over Sybil's
piano by the hour; he brought Russian airs which he taught her to sing,
and, if the truth were known, he bored Madeleine desperately, for she
undertook to act the part of duenna to her younger sister.

A very different visitor was Mr. C. C. French, a young member of
Congress from Connecticut, who aspired to act the part of the educated
gentleman in politics, and to purify the public tone. He had reform
principles and an unfortunately conceited maimer; he was rather wealthy,
rather clever, rather well-educated, rather honest, and rather vulgar.
His allegiance was divided between Mrs. Lee and her sister, whom he
infuriated by addressing as “Miss Sybil” with patronising familiarity.
He was particularly strong in what he called “badinaige,” and his
playful but ungainly attempts at wit drove Mrs.

Lee beyond the bounds of patience. When in a solemn mood, he talked as
though he were practising for the ear of a college debating society,
and with a still worse effect on the patience; but with all this he was
useful, always bubbling with the latest political gossip, and deeply
interested in the fate of party stakes. Quite another sort of person was
Mr. Hartbeest Schneidekoupon, a citizen of Philadelphia, though commonly
resident in New York, where he had fallen a victim to Sybil's charms,
and made efforts to win her young affections by instructing her in the
mysteries of currency and protection, to both which subjects he was
devoted. To forward these two interests and to watch over Miss Ross's
welfare, he made periodical visits to Washington, where he closeted
himself with committee-men and gave expensive dinners to members of
Congress. Mr. Schneidekoupon was rich, and about thirty years old, tall
and thin, with bright eyes and smooth face, elaborate manners and
much loquacity. He had the reputation of turning rapid intellectual
somersaults, partly to amuse himself and partly to startle society. At
one moment he was artistic, and discoursed scientifically about his
own paintings; at another he was literary, and wrote a book on “Noble
Living,” with a humanitarian purpose; at another he was devoted to
sport, rode a steeplechase, played polo, and set up a four-in-hand; his
last occupation was to establish in Philadelphia the Protective Review,
a periodical in the interests of American industry, which he edited
himself, as a stepping-stone to Congress, the Cabinet, and the
Presidency. At about the same time he bought a yacht, and heavy bets
were pending among his sporting friends whether he would manage to
sink first his Review or his yacht. But he was an amiable and excellent
fellow through all his eccentricities, and he brought to Mrs. Lee the
simple outpourings of the amateur politician.

A much higher type of character was Mr. Nathan Gore, of Massachusetts,
a handsome man with a grey beard, a straight, sharply cut nose, and a
fine, penetrating eye; in his youth a successful poet whose satires made
a noise in their day, and are still remembered for the pungency and wit
of a few verses; then a deep student in Europe for many years, until his
famous “History of Spain in America” placed him instantly at the head of
American historians, and made him minister at Madrid, where he remained
four years to his entire satisfaction, this being the nearest approach
to a patent of nobility and a government pension which the American
citizen can attain. A change of administration had reduced him to
private life again, and after some years of retirement he was now in
Washington, willing to be restored to his old mission. Every President
thinks it respectable to have at least one literary man in his pay, and
Mr. Gore's prospects were fair for obtaining his object, as he had the
active support of a majority of the Massachusetts delegation. He was
abominably selfish, colossally egoistic, and not a little vain; but
he was shrewd; he knew how to hold his tongue; he could flatter
dexterously, and he had learned to eschew satire. Only in confidence and
among friends he would still talk freely, but Mrs. Lee was not yet on
those terms with him. These were all men, and there was no want of women
in Mrs.

Lee's parlour; but, after all, they are able to describe themselves
better than any poor novelist can describe them. Generally two currents
of conversation ran on together--one round Sybil, the other about
Madeleine.

“Mees Ross,” said Count Popoff, leading in a handsome young foreigner,
“I have your permission to present to you my friend Count Orsini,
Secretary of the Italian Legation. Are you at home this afternoon? Count
Orsini sings also.”

“We are charmed to see Count Orsini. It is well you came so late, for I
have this moment come in from making Cabinet calls. They were so queer!
I have been crying with laughter for an hour past.” “Do you find these
calls amusing?” asked Popoff, gravely and diplomatically. “Indeed I
do! I went with Julia Schneidekoupon, you know, Madeleine; the
Schneidekoupons are descended from all the Kings of Israel, and are
prouder than Solomon in his glory. And when we got into the house of
some dreadful woman from Heaven knows where, imagine my feelings at
overhearing this conversation: 'What may be your family name, ma'am?'
'Schneidekoupon is my name,' replies Julia, very tall and straight.
'Have you any friends whom I should likely know?' 'I think not,' says
Julia, severely. 'Wal! I don't seem to remember of ever having heerd the
name. But I s'pose it's all right. I like to know who calls.' I almost
had hysterics when we got into the street, but Julia could not see the
joke at all.”

Count Orsini was not quite sure that he himself saw the joke, so he only
smiled becomingly and showed his teeth. For simple, childlike vanity and
self-consciousness nothing equals an Italian Secretary of Legation at
twenty-five. Yet conscious that the effect of his personal beauty
would perhaps be diminished by permanent silence, he ventured to murmur
presently:

“Do you not find it very strange, this society in America?”

“Society!” laughed Sybil with gay contempt. “There are no snakes in
America, any more than in Norway.”

“Snakes, mademoiselle!” repeated Orsini, with the doubtful expression of
one who is not quite certain whether he shall risk walking on thin ice,
and decides to go softly: “Snakes! Indeed they would rather be doves I
would call them.”

A kind laugh from Sybil strengthened into conviction his hope that
he had made a joke in this unknown tongue. His face brightened, his
confidence returned; once or twice he softly repeated to himself: “Not
snakes; they would be doves!” But Mrs. Lee's sensitive ear had caught
Sybil's remark, and detected in it a certain tone of condescension which
was not to her taste.

The impassive countenances of these bland young Secretaries of Legation
seemed to acquiesce far too much as a matter of course in the idea
that there was no society except in the old world. She broke into the
conversation with an emphasis that fluttered the dove-cote:

“Society in America? Indeed there is society in America, and very
good society too; but it has a code of its own, and new-comers seldom
understand it. I will tell you what it is, Mr. Orsini, and you will
never be in danger of making any mistake. 'Society' in America means all
the honest, kindly-mannered, pleasant-voiced women, and all the good,
brave, unassuming men, between the Atlantic and the Pacific. Each
of these has a free pass in every city and village, 'good for this
generation only,' and it depends on each to make use of this pass or
not as it may happen to suit his or her fancy. To this rule there are
no exceptions, and those who say 'Abraham is our father' will surely
furnish food for that humour which is the staple product of our
country.”

The alarmed youths, who did not in the least understand the meaning of
this demonstration, looked on with a feeble attempt at acquiescence,
while Mrs.

Lee brandished her sugar-tongs in the act of transferring a lump of
sugar to her cup, quite unconscious of the slight absurdity of the
gesture, while Sybil stared in amazement, for it was not often that
her sister waved the stars and stripes so energetically. Whatever their
silent criticisms might be, however, Mrs. Lee was too much in earnest to
be conscious of them, or, indeed, to care for anything but what she
was saying. There was a moment's pause when she came to the end of her
speech, and then the thread of talk was quietly taken up again where
Sybil's incipient sneer had broken it.

Carrington came in. “What have you been doing at the Capitol?” asked
Madeleine.

“Lobbying!” was the reply, given in the semi-serious tone of
Carrington's humour.

“So soon, and Congress only two days old?” exclaimed Mrs. Lee.

“Madam,” rejoined Carrington, with his quietest malice, “Congressmen are
like birds of the air, which are caught only by the early worm.” “Good
afternoon, Mrs. Lee. Miss Sybil, how do you do again? Which of these
gentlemen's hearts are you feeding upon now?” This was the refined style
of Mr. French, indulging in what he was pleased to term “badinaige.” He,
too, was on his way from the Capitol, and had come in for a cup of tea
and a little human society. Sybil made a face which plainly expressed a
longing to inflict on Mr. French some grievous personal wrong, but she
pretended not to hear. He sat down by Madeleine, and asked, “Did you see
Ratcliffe yesterday?”

“Yes,” said Madeleine; “he was here last evening with Mr. Carrington and
one or two others.”

“Did he say anything about politics?”

“Not a word. We talked mostly about books.”

“Books! What does he know about books?”

“You must ask him.”

“Well, this is the most ridiculous situation we are all in. No one
knows anything about the new President. You could take your oath that
everybody is in the dark. Ratcliffe says he knows as little as the rest
of us, but it can't be true; he is too old a politician not to have
wires in his hand; and only to-day one of the pages of the Senate told
my colleague Cutter that a letter sent off by him yesterday was directed
to Sam Grimes, of North Bend, who, as every one knows, belongs to the
President's particular crowd.--Why, Mr. Schneidekoupon! How do you do?
When did you come on?”

“Thank you; this morning,” replied Mr. Schneidekoupon, just entering the
room. “So glad to see you again, Mrs. Lee. How do you and your sister
like Washington? Do you know I have brought Julia on for a visit? I
thought I should find her here.

“She has just gone. She has been all the afternoon with Sybil, making
calls. She says you want her here to lobby for you, Mr. Schneidekoupon.
Is it true?”

“So I did,” replied he, with a laugh, “but she is precious little use.
So I've come to draft you into the service.”

“Me!”

“Yes; you know we all expect Senator Ratcliffe to be Secretary of the
Treasury, and it is very important for us to keep him straight on the
currency and the tariff. So I have come on to establish more intimate
relations with him, as they say in diplomacy. I want to get him to dine
with me at Welckley's, but as I know he keeps very shy of politics I
thought my only chance was to make it a ladies' dinner, so I brought on
Julia. I shall try and get Mrs. Schuyler Clinton, and I depend upon you
and your sister to help Julia out.”

“Me! at a lobby dinner! Is that proper?”

“Why not? You shall choose the guests.”

“I never heard of such a thing; but it would certainly be amusing. Sybil
must not go, but I might.” “Excuse me; Julia depends upon Miss Ross, and
will not go to table without her.”

“Well,” assented Mrs. Lee, hesitatingly, “perhaps if you get Mrs.
Clinton, and if your sister is there And who else?”

“Choose your own company.”

“I know no one.”

“Oh yes; here is French, not quite sound on the tariff, but good for
what we want just now. Then we can get Mr. Gore; he has his little
hatchet to grind too, and will be glad to help grind ours. We only want
two or three more, and I will have an extra man or so to fill up.”

“Do ask the Speaker. I want to know him.”

“I will, and Carrington, and my Pennsylvania Senator. That will do
nobly. Remember, Welckley's, Saturday at seven.”

Meanwhile Sybil had been at the piano, and when she had sung for a time,
Orsini was induced to take her place, and show that it was possible
to sing without injury to one's beauty. Baron Jacobi came in and found
fault with them both. Little Miss Dare--commonly known among her male
friends as little Daredevil--who was always absorbed in some flirtation
with a Secretary of Legation, came in, quite unaware that Popoff was
present, and retired with him into a corner, while Orsini and Jacobi
bullied poor Sybil, and fought with each other at the piano; everybody
was talking with very little reference to any reply, when at last Mrs.
Lee drove them all out of the room: “We are quiet people,” said she,
“and we dine at half-past six.”

Senator Ratcliffe had not failed to make his Sunday evening call upon
Mrs.

Lee. Perhaps it was not strictly correct to say that they had talked
books all the evening, but whatever the conversation was, it had
only confirmed Mr. Ratcliffe's admiration for Mrs. Lee, who, without
intending to do so, had acted a more dangerous part than if she had been
the most accomplished of coquettes. Nothing could be more fascinating
to the weary politician in his solitude than the repose of Mrs. Lee's
parlour, and when Sybil sang for him one or two simple airs--she
said they were foreign hymns, the Senator being, or being considered,
orthodox--Mr. Ratcliffe's heart yearned toward the charming girl quite
with the sensations of a father, or even of an elder brother.

His brother senators very soon began to remark that the Prairie Giant
had acquired a trick of looking up to the ladies' gallery. One day Mr.
Jonathan Andrews, the special correspondent of the New York Sidereal
System, a very friendly organ, approached Senator Schuyler Clinton with
a puzzled look on his face.

“Can you tell me,” said he, “what has happened to Silas P. Ratcliffe?
Only a moment ago I was talking with him at his seat on a very important
subject, about which I must send his opinions off to New York to-night,
when, in the middle of a sentence, he stopped short, got up without
looking at me, and left the Senate Chamber, and now I see him in the
gallery talking with a lady whose face I don't know.”

Senator Clinton slowly adjusted his gold eye-glasses and looked up at
the place indicated: “Ah! Mrs. Lightfoot Lee! I think I will say a word
to her myself;” and turning his back on the special correspondent, he
skipped away with youthful agility after the Senator from Illinois.

“Devil!” muttered Mr. Andrews; “what has got into the old fools?” and in
a still less audible murmur as he looked up to Mrs. Lee, then in close
conversation with Ratcliffe: “Had I better make an item of that?”

When young Mr. Schneidekoupon called upon Senator Ratcliffe to invite
him to the dinner at Welckley's, he found that gentleman overwhelmed
with work, as he averred, and very little disposed to converse. No! he
did not now go out to dinner. In the present condition of the public
business he found it impossible to spare the time for such amusements.
He regretted to decline Mr. Schneidekoupon's civility, but there were
imperative reasons why he should abstain for the present from social
entertainments; he had made but one exception to his rule, and only at
the pressing request of his old friend Senator Clinton, and on a very
special occasion.

Mr. Schneidekoupon was deeply vexed--the more, he said, because he had
meant to beg Mr. and Mrs. Clinton to be of the party, as well as a very
charming lady who rarely went into society, but who had almost consented
to come.

“Who is that?” inquired the Senator.

“A Mrs. Lightfoot Lee, of New York. Probably you do not know her well
enough to admire her as I do; but I think her quite the most intelligent
woman I ever met.”

The Senator's cold eyes rested for a moment on the young man's open face
with a peculiar expression of distrust. Then he solemnly said, in his
deepest senatorial tones:

“My young friend, at my time of life men have other things to occupy
them than women, however intelligent they may be. Who else is to be of
your party?”

Mr. Schneidekoupon named his list.

“And for Saturday evening at seven, did you say?”

“Saturday at seven.”

“I fear there is little chance of my attending, but I will not
absolutely decline. Perhaps when the moment arrives, I may find myself
able to be there. But do not count upon me--do not count upon me. Good
day, Mr. Schneidekoupon.”

Schneidekoupon was rather a simple-minded young man, who saw no deeper
than his neighbours into the secrets of the universe, and he went off
swearing roundly at “the infernal airs these senators give themselves.”
 He told Mrs.

Lee all the conversation, as indeed he was compelled to do under penalty
of bringing her to his party under false pretences.

“Just my luck,” said he; “here I am forced to ask no end of people to
meet a man, who at the same time says he shall probably not come. Why,
under the stars, couldn't he say, like other people, whether he was
coming or not? I've known dozens of senators, Mrs. Lee, and they're all
like that. They never think of any one but themselves.”

Mrs. Lee smiled rather a forced smile, and soothed his wounded feelings;
she had no doubt the dinner would be very agreeable whether the Senator
were there or not; at any rate she would do all she could to carry it
off well, and Sybil should wear her newest dress. Still she was a little
grave, and Mr. Schneidekoupon could only declare that she was a trump;
that he had told Ratcliffe she was the cleverest woman he ever met, and
he might have added the most obliging, and Ratcliffe had only looked
at him as though he were a green ape. At all which Mrs. Lee laughed
good-naturedly, and sent him away as soon as she could.

When he was gone, she walked up and down the room and thought. She saw
the meaning of Ratcliffe's sudden change in tone. She had no more doubt
of his coming to the dinner than she had of the reason why he came.
And was it possible that she was being drawn into something very near
a flirtation with a man twenty years her senior; a politician from
Illinois; a huge, ponderous, grey-eyed, bald senator, with a Websterian
head, who lived in Peonia? The idea was almost too absurd to be
credited; but on the whole the thing itself was rather amusing. “I
suppose senators can look out for themselves like other men,” was her
final conclusion. She thought only of his danger, and she felt a sort
of compassion for him as she reflected on the possible consequences of a
great, absorbing love at his time of life.

Her conscience was a little uneasy; but of herself she never thought.
Yet it is a historical fact that elderly senators have had a curious
fascination for young and handsome women. Had they looked out for
themselves too? And which parties most needed to be looked after?

When Madeleine and her sister arrived at Welckley's 's the next Saturday
evening, they found poor Schneidekoupon in a temper very unbecoming a
host.

“He won't come! I told you he wouldn't come!” said he to Madeleine, as
he handed her into the house. “If I ever turn communist, it will be for
the fun of murdering a senator.”

Madeleine consoled him gently, but he continued to use, behind Mr.
Clinton's back, language the most offensive and improper towards the
Senate, and at last, ringing the bell, he sharply ordered the head
waiter to serve dinner.

At that very moment the door opened, and Senator Ratcliffe's stately
figure appeared on the threshold. His eye instantly caught Madeleine's,
and she almost laughed aloud, for she saw that the Senator was dressed
with very unsenatorial neatness; that he had actually a flower in his
burton-hole and no gloves!

After the enthusiastic description which Schneidekoupon had given of
Mrs.

Lee's charms, he could do no less than ask Senator Ratcliffe to take her
in to dinner, which he did without delay. Either this, or the champagne,
or some occult influence, had an extraordinary effect upon him. He
appeared ten years younger than usual; his face was illuminated; his
eyes glowed; he seemed bent on proving his kinship to the immortal
Webster by rivalling his convivial powers. He dashed into the
conversation; laughed, jested, and ridiculed; told stories in Yankee
and Western dialect; gave sharp little sketches of amusing political
experiences.

“Never was more surprised in my life,” whispered Senator Krebs, of
Pennsylvania, across the table to Schneidekoupon. “Hadn't an idea that
Ratcliffe was so entertaining.”

And Mr. Clinton, who sat by Madeleine on the other side, whispered low
into her ear: “I am afraid, my dear Mrs. Lee, that you are responsible
for this. He never talks so to the Senate.”

Nay, he even rose to a higher flight, and told the story of President
Lincoln's death-bed with a degree of feeling that brought tears into
their eyes. The other guests made no figure at all. The Speaker consumed
his solitary duck and his lonely champagne in a corner without giving a
sign.

Even Mr. Gore, who was not wont to hide his light under any kind of
extinguisher, made no attempt to claim the floor, and applauded with
enthusiasm the conversation of his opposite neighbour. Ill-natured
people might say that Mr. Gore saw in Senator Ratcliffe a possible
Secretary of State; be this as it may, he certainly said to Mrs.
Clinton, in an aside that was perfectly audible to every one at the
table: “How brilliant! what an original mind! what a sensation he would
make abroad!” And it was quite true, apart from the mere momentary
effect of dinner-table talk, that there was a certain bigness about
the man; a keen practical sagacity; a bold freedom of self-assertion; a
broad way of dealing with what he knew.

Carrington was the only person at table who looked on with a perfectly
cool head, and who criticised in a hostile spirit. Carrington's
impression of Ratcliffe was perhaps beginning to be warped by a shade
of jealousy, for he was in a peculiarly bad temper this evening, and his
irritation was not wholly concealed.

“If one only had any confidence in the man!” he muttered to French, who
sat by him.

This unlucky remark set French to thinking how he could draw
Ratcliffe out, and accordingly, with his usual happy manner, combining
self-conceit and high principles, he began to attack the Senator with
some “badinaige” on the delicate subject of Civil Service Reform, a
subject almost as dangerous in political conversation at Washington as
slavery itself in old days before the war. French was a reformer, and
lost no occasion of impressing his views; but unluckily he was a very
light weight, and his manner was a little ridiculous, so that even Mrs.
Lee, who was herself a warm reformer, sometimes went over to the other
side when he talked. No sooner had he now shot his little arrow at the
Senator, than that astute man saw his opportunity, and promised himself
the pleasure of administering to Mr.

French punishment such as he knew would delight the company. Reformer
as Mrs. Lee was, and a little alarmed at the roughness of Ratcliffe's
treatment, she could not blame the Prairie Giant, as she ought, who,
after knocking poor French down, rolled him over and over in the mud.

“Are you financier enough, Mr. French, to know what are the most famous
products of Connecticut?”

Mr. French modestly suggested that he thought its statesmen best
answered that description.

“No, sir! even there you're wrong. The showmen beat you on your own
ground. But every child in the union knows that the most famous products
of Connecticut are Yankee notions, nutmegs made of wood and clocks that
won't go. Now, your Civil Service Reform is just such another Yankee
notion; it's a wooden nutmeg; it's a clock with a show case and sham
works. And you know it! You are precisely the old-school Connecticut
peddler. You have gone about peddling your wooden nutmegs until you have
got yourself into Congress, and now you pull them out of your pockets
and not only want us to take them at your own price, but you lecture us
on our sins if we don't. Well! we don't mind your doing that at home.
Abuse us as much as you like to your constituents. Get as many votes as
you can. But don't electioneer here, because we know you intimately, and
we've all been a little in the wooden nutmeg business ourselves.”

Senator Clinton and Senator Krebs chuckled high approval over this
punishment of poor French, which was on the level of their idea of wit.
They were all in the nutmeg business, as Ratcliffe said. The victim
tried to make head against them; he protested that his nutmegs were
genuine; he sold no goods that he did not guarantee; and that this
particular article was actually guaranteed by the national conventions
of both political parties.

“Then what you want, Mr. French, is a common school education. You
need a little study of the alphabet. Or if you won't believe me, ask my
brother senators here what chance there is for your Reforms so long
as the American citizen is what he is.”

“You'll not get much comfort in my State, Mr. French,” growled the
senator from Pennsylvania, with a sneer; “suppose you come and try.”

“Well, well!” said the benevolent Mr. Schuyler Clinton, gleaming
benignantly through his gold spectacles; “don't be too hard on French.
He means well. Perhaps he's not very wise, but he does good. I know more
about it than any of you, and I don't deny that the thing is all bad.
Only, as Mr. Ratcliffe says, the difficulty is in the people, not in us.
Go to work on them, French, and let us alone.”

French repented of his attack, and contented himself by muttering to
Carrington: “What a set of damned old reprobates they are!”

“They are right, though, in one thing,” was Carrington's reply: “their
advice is good. Never ask one of them to reform anything; if you do, you
will be reformed yourself.”

The dinner ended as brilliantly as it began, and Schneidekoupon was
delighted with his success. He had made himself particularly agreeable
to Sybil by confiding in her all his hopes and fears about the tariff
and the finances. When the ladies left the table, Ratcliffe could not
stay for a cigar; he must get back to his rooms, where he knew several
men were waiting for him; he would take his leave of the ladies and
hurry away. But when the gentlemen came up nearly an hour afterwards
they found Ratcliffe still taking his leave of the ladies, who were
delighted at his entertaining conversation; and when at last he really
departed, he said to Mrs. Lee, as though it were quite a matter of
course: “You are at home as usual to-morrow evening?” Madeleine smiled,
bowed, and he went his way.

As the two sisters drove home that night, Madeleine was unusually
silent.

Sybil yawned convulsively and then apologized:

“Mr. Schneidekoupon is very nice and good-natured, but a whole evening
of him goes a long way; and that horrid Senator Krebs would not say a
word, and drank a great deal too much wine, though it couldn't make him
any more stupid than he is. I don't think I care for senators.” Then,
wearily, after a pause: “Well, Maude, I do hope you've got what you
wanted. I'm sure you must have had politics enough. Haven't you got to
the heart of your great American mystery yet?”

“Pretty near it, I think,” said Madeleine, half to herself.



Chapter IV

SUNDAY evening was stormy, and some enthusiasm was required to make one
face its perils for the sake of society. Nevertheless, a few intimates
made their appearance as usual at Mrs. Lee's. The faithful Popoff was
there, and Miss Dare also ran in to pass an hour with her dear Sybil;
but as she passed the whole evening in a corner with Popoff, she must
have been disappointed in her object. Carrington came, and Baron Jacobi.
Schneidekoupon and his sister dined with Mrs. Lee, and remained after
dinner, while Sybil and Julia Schneidekoupon compared conclusions about
Washington society. The happy idea also occurred to Mr. Gore that,
inasmuch as Mrs. Lee's house was but a step from his hotel, he might as
well take the chance of amusement there as the certainty of solitude
in his rooms. Finally, Senator Ratcliffe duly made his appearance, and,
having established himself with a cup of tea by Madeleine's side, was
soon left to enjoy a quiet talk with her, the rest of the party by
common consent occupying themselves with each other. Under cover of
the murmur of conversation in the room, Mr. Ratcliffe quickly became
confidential.

“I came to suggest that, if you want to hear an interesting debate,
you should come up to the Senate to-morrow. I am told that Garrard, of
Louisiana, means to attack my last speech, and I shall probably in that
case have to answer him. With you for a critic I shall speak better.”

“Am I such an amiable critic?” asked Madeleine.

“I never heard that amiable critics were the best,” said he; “justice is
the soul of good criticism, and it is only justice that I ask and expect
from you.”

“What good does this speaking do?” inquired she. “Are you any nearer the
end of your difficulties by means of your speeches?”

“I hardly know yet. Just now we are in dead water; but this can't last
long. In fact, I am not afraid to tell you, though of course you will
not repeat it to any human being, that we have taken measures to force
an issue. Certain gentlemen, myself among the rest, have written letters
meant for the President's eye, though not addressed directly to him, and
intended to draw out an expression of some sort that will show us what
to expect.”

“Oh!” laughed Madeleine, “I knew about that a week ago.”

“About what?”

“About your letter to Sam Grimes, of North Bend.”

“What have you heard about my letter to Sam Grimes, of North Bend?”
 ejaculated Ratcliffe, a little abruptly.

“Oh, you do not know how admirably I have organised my secret service
bureau,” said she. “Representative Cutter cross-questioned one of the
Senate pages, and obliged him to confess that he had received from you a
letter to be posted, which letter was addressed to Mr. Grimes, of North
Bend.”

“And, of course, he told this to French, and French told you,” said
Ratcliffe; “I see. If I had known this I would not have let French off
so gently last night, for I prefer to tell you my own story without his
embellishments. But it was my fault. I should not have trusted a page.
Nothing is a secret here long. But one thing that Mr. Cutter did not
find out was that several other gentlemen wrote letters at the same
time, for the same purpose. Your friend, Mr. Clinton, wrote; Krebs
wrote; and one or two members.”

“I suppose I must not ask what you said?”

“You may. We agreed that it was best to be very mild and conciliatory,
and to urge the President only to give us some indication of his
intentions, in order that we might not run counter to them. I drew a
strong picture of the effect of the present situation on the party, and
hinted that I had no personal wishes to gratify.”

“And what do you think will be the result?”

“I think we shall somehow manage to straighten things out,” said
Ratcliffe.

“The difficulty is only that the new President has little experience,
and is suspicious. He thinks we shall intrigue to tie his hands, and he
means to tie ours in advance. I don't know him personally, but those
who do, and who are fair judges, say that, though rather narrow and
obstinate, he is honest enough, and will come round. I have no doubt
I could settle it all with him in an hour's talk, but it is out of the
question for me to go to him unless I am asked, and to ask me to come
would be itself a settlement.”

“What, then, is the danger you fear?”

“That he will offend all the important party leaders in order to
conciliate unimportant ones, perhaps sentimental ones, like your friend
French; that he will make foolish appointments without taking advice. By
the way, have you seen French to-day?”

“No,” replied Madeleine; “I think he must be sore at your treatment of
him last evening. You were very rude to him.”

“Not a bit,” said Ratcliffe; “these reformers need it. His attack on me
was meant for a challenge. I saw it in his manner.

“But is reform really so impossible as you describe it? Is it quite
hopeless?”

“Reform such as he wants is utterly hopeless, and not even desirable.”

Mrs. Lee, with much earnestness of manner, still pressed her question:

“Surely something can be done to check corruption. Are we for ever to
be at the mercy of thieves and ruffians? Is a respectable government
impossible in a democracy?”

Her warmth attracted Jacobi's attention, and he spoke across the room.
“What is that you say, Mrs. Lee? What is it about corruption?”

All the gentlemen began to listen and gather about them.

“I am asking Senator Ratcliffe,” said she, “what is to become of us if
corruption is allowed to go unchecked.”

“And may I venture to ask permission to hear Mr. Ratcliffe's reply?”
 asked the baron.

“My reply,” said Ratcliffe, “is that no representative government can
long be much better or much worse than the society it represents. Purify
society and you purify the government. But try to purify the government
artificially and you only aggravate failure.”

“A very statesmanlike reply,” said Baron Jacobi, with a formal bow, but
his tone had a shade of mockery. Carrington, who had listened with
a darkening face, suddenly turned to the baron and asked him what
conclusion he drew from the reply.

“Ah!” exclaimed the baron, with his wickedest leer, “what for is my
conclusion good? You Americans believe yourselves to be excepted from
the operation of general laws. You care not for experience. I have lived
seventy-five years, and all that time in the midst of corruption. I am
corrupt myself, only I do have courage to proclaim it, and you others
have it not. Rome, Paris, Vienna, Petersburg, London, all are corrupt;
only Washington is pure! Well, I declare to you that in all my
experience I have found no society which has had elements of corruption
like the United States. The children in the street are corrupt, and know
how to cheat me. The cities are all corrupt, and also the towns and the
counties and the States' legislatures and the judges. Everywhere men
betray trusts both public and private, steal money, run away with public
funds. Only in the Senate men take no money. And you gentlemen in the
Senate very well declare that your great United States, which is the
head of the civilized world, can never learn anything from the example
of corrupt Europe. You are right--quite right! The great United States
needs not an example. I do much regret that I have not yet one hundred
years to live. If I could then come back to this city, I should find
myself very content--much more than now. I am always content where there
is much corruption, and ma parole d'honneur!” broke out the old man with
fire and gesture, “the United States will then be more corrupt than Rome
under Caligula; more corrupt than the Church under Leo X.; more corrupt
than France under the Regent!”

As the baron closed his little harangue, which he delivered directly at
the senator sitting underneath him, he had the satisfaction to see that
every one was silent and listening with deep attention. He seemed to
enjoy annoying the senator, and he had the satisfaction of seeing that
the senator was visibly annoyed. Ratcliffe looked sternly at the baron
and said, with some curtness, that he saw no reason to accept such
conclusions.

Conversation flagged, and all except the baron were relieved when Sybil,
at Schneidekoupon's request, sat down at the piano to sing what she
called a hymn. So soon as the song was over, Ratcliffe, who seemed to
have been curiously thrown off his balance by Jacobi's harangue, pleaded
urgent duties at his rooms, and retired. The others soon afterwards went
off in a body, leaving only Carrington and Gore, who had seated himself
by Madeleine, and was at once dragged by her into a discussion of the
subject which perplexed her, and for the moment threw over her mind a
net of irresistible fascination.

“The baron discomfited the senator,” said Gore, with a certain
hesitation.

“Why did Ratcliffe let himself be trampled upon in that manner?”

“I wish you would explain why,” replied Mrs. Lee; “tell me,
Mr. Gore--you who represent cultivation and literary taste
hereabouts--please tell me what to think about Baron Jacobi's speech.
Who and what is to be believed? Mr. Ratcliffe seems honest and wise. Is
he a corruptionist? He believes in the people, or says he does. Is he
telling the truth or not?”

Gore was too experienced in politics to be caught in such a trap as
this. He evaded the question. “Mr. Ratcliffe has a practical piece of
work to do; his business is to make laws and advise the President;
he does it extremely well. We have no other equally good practical
politician; it is unfair to require him to be a crusader besides.”

“No!” interposed Carrington, curtly; “but he need not obstruct crusades.
He need not talk virtue and oppose the punishment of vice.”

“He is a shrewd practical politician,” replied Gore, “and he feels first
the weak side of any proposed political tactics.”

With a sigh of despair Madeleine went on: “Who, then, is right? How can
we all be right? Half of our wise men declare that the world is going
straight to perdition; the other half that it is fast becoming perfect.
Both cannot be right. There is only one thing in life,” she went on,
laughing, “that I must and will have before I die. I must know whether
America is right or wrong. Just now this question is a very practical
one, for I really want to know whether to believe in Mr. Ratcliffe. If I
throw him overboard, everything must go, for he is only a specimen.”

“Why not believe in Mr. Ratcliffe?” said Gore; “I believe in him myself,
and am not afraid to say so.”

Carrington, to whom Ratcliffe now began to represent the spirit of evil,
interposed here, and observed that he imagined Mr. Gore had other
guides besides, and steadier ones than Ratcliffe, to believe in; while
Madeleine, with a certain feminine perspicacity, struck at a much weaker
point in Mr.

Gore's armour, and asked point-blank whether he believed also in
what Ratcliffe represented: “Do you yourself think democracy the best
government, and universal suffrage a success?”

Mr. Gore saw himself pinned to the wall, and he turned at bay with
almost the energy of despair:

“These are matters about which I rarely talk in society; they are like
the doctrine of a personal God; of a future life; of revealed religion;
subjects which one naturally reserves for private reflection. But since
you ask for my political creed, you shall have it. I only condition that
it shall be for you alone, never to be repeated or quoted as mine. I
believe in democracy. I accept it. I will faithfully serve and defend
it. I believe in it because it appears to me the inevitable consequence
of what has gone before it. Democracy asserts the fact that the masses
are now raised to a higher intelligence than formerly. All our
civilisation aims at this mark. We want to do what we can to help it. I
myself want to see the result. I grant it is an experiment, but it is
the only direction society can take that is worth its taking; the only
conception of its duty large enough to satisfy its instincts; the only
result that is worth an effort or a risk. Every other possible step is
backward, and I do not care to repeat the past. I am glad to see society
grapple with issues in which no one can afford to be neutral.”

“And supposing your experiment fails,” said Mrs. Lee; “suppose society
destroys itself with universal suffrage, corruption, and communism.”

“I wish, Mrs. Lee, you would visit the Observatory with me some evening,
and look at Sirius. Did you ever make the acquaintance of a fixed star?
I believe astronomers reckon about twenty millions of them in sight, and
an infinite possibility of invisible millions, each one of which is a
sun, like ours, and may have satellites like our planet. Suppose you see
one of these fixed stars suddenly increase in brightness, and are
told that a satellite has fallen into it and is burning up, its career
finished, its capacities exhausted? Curious, is it not; but what does it
matter? Just as much as the burning up of a moth at your candle.”

Madeleine shuddered a little. “I cannot get to the height of your
philosophy,” said she. “You are wandering among the infinites, and I am
finite.”

“Not at all! But I have faith; not perhaps in the old dogmas, but in the
new ones; faith in human nature; faith in science; faith in the survival
of the fittest. Let us be true to our time, Mrs. Lee! If our age is to
be beaten, let us die in the ranks. If it is to be victorious, let us be
first to lead the column. Anyway, let us not be skulkers or grumblers.
There! have I repeated my catechism correctly? You would have it! Now
oblige me by forgetting it. I should lose my character at home if it got
out. Good night!”

Mrs. Lee duly appeared at the Capitol the next day, as she could not but
do after Senator Ratcliffe's pointed request. She went alone, for Sybil
had positively refused to go near the Capitol again, and Madeleine
thought that on the whole this was not an occasion for enrolling
Carrington in her service. But Ratcliffe did not speak. The debate was
unexpectedly postponed.

He joined Mrs. Lee in the gallery, however, sat with her as long as she
would allow, and became still more confidential, telling her that he had
received the expected reply from Grimes, of North Bend, and that it had
enclosed a letter written by the President-elect to Mr. Grimes in regard
to the advances made by Mr. Ratcliffe and his friends.

“It is not a handsome letter,” said he; “indeed, a part of it is
positively insulting. I would like to read you one extract from it, and
hear your opinion as to how it should be treated.” Taking the letter
from his pocket, he sought out the passage, and read as follows: “'I
cannot lose sight, too, of the consideration that these three Senators'
(he means Clinton, Krebs, and me) are popularly considered to be the
most influential members of that so-called senatorial ring, which has
acquired such general notoriety. While I shall always receive their
communications with all due respect, I must continue to exercise
complete freedom of action in consulting other political advisers as
well as these, and I must in all cases make it my first object to follow
the wishes of the people, not always most truly represented by their
nominal representatives.' What say you to that precious piece of
presidential manners?”

“At least I like his courage,” said Mrs. Lee.

“Courage is one thing; common sense is another. This letter is a studied
insult. He has knocked me off the track once. He means to do it again.
It is a declaration of war. What ought I to do?”

“Whatever is most for the public good.” said Madeleine, gravely.

Ratcliffe looked into her face with such undisguised delight--there was
so little possibility of mistaking or ignoring the expression of his
eyes, that she shrank back with a certain shock. She was not prepared
for so open a demonstration. He hardened his features at once, and went
on:

“But what is most for the public good?”

“That you know better than I,” said Madeleine; “only one thing is clear
to me. If you let yourself be ruled by your private feelings, you will
make a greater mistake than he. Now I must go, for I have visits to
make. The next time I come, Mr. Ratcliffe, you must keep your word
better.”

When they next met, Ratcliffe read to her a part of his reply to Mr.
Grimes, which ran thus: “It is the lot of every party leader to suffer
from attacks and to commit errors. It is true, as the President says,
that I have been no exception to this law. Believing as I do that great
results can only be accomplished by great parties, I have uniformly
yielded my own personal opinions where they have failed to obtain
general assent. I shall continue to follow this course, and the
President may with perfect confidence count upon my disinterested
support of all party measures, even though I may not be consulted in
originating them.”

Mrs. Lee listened attentively, and then said: “Have you never refused to
go with your party?”

“Never!” was Ratcliffe's firm reply.

Madeleine still more thoughtfully inquired again: “Is nothing more
powerful than party allegiance?”

“Nothing, except national allegiance,” replied Ratcliffe, still more
firmly.