county council control is practically his bill; so you may say he's in the
government even before he's in the House."
"One's easier than the other," said Harry, carelessly. "I bet the squire's a
bigger pot than the county council in that county. Verner is pretty well rooted;
all these rural places are what you call reactionary. Damning aristocrats won't
alter it."
"He damns them rather well," observed Ashton. "We never had a better
meeting than the one in Barkington, which generally goes Constitutional. And
when he said, 'Sir Francis may boast of blue blood; let us show we have red
blood,' and went on to talk about manhood and liberty, the room simply rose at
him."
"Speaks very well," said Lord Saltoun, gruffly, making his only
contribution to the conversation so far.
Then the almost equally silent Horne Fisher suddenly spoke, without
taking his brooding eyes off the fire.
"What I can't understand," he said, "is why nobody is ever slanged for the
real reason."
"Hullo!" remarked Harry, humorously, "you beginning to take notice?"
"Well, take Verner," continued Horne Fisher. "If we want to attack Verner,
why not attack him? Why compliment him on being a romantic reactionary
aristocrat? Who is Verner? Where does he come from? His name sounds old,
but I never heard of it before, as the man said of the Crucifixion. Why talk
about his blue blood? His blood may be gamboge yellow with green spots, for
all anybody knows. All we know is that the old squire, Hawker, somehow ran
through his money (and his second wife's, I suppose, for she was rich enough),
and sold the estate to a man named Verner. What did he make his money in?
Oil? Army contracts?"
"I don't know," said Saltoun, looking at him thoughtfully.
"First thing I ever knew you didn't know," cried the exuberant
Harry.
"And there's more, besides," went on Horne Fisher, who seemed to have
suddenly found his tongue. "If we want country people to vote for us, why
don't we get somebody with some notion about the country? We don't talk to
people in Threadneedle Street about nothing but turnips and pigsties. Why do
we talk to people in Somerset about nothing but slums and socialism? Why
don't we give the squire's land to the squire's tenants, instead of dragging in
the county council?"