The Duke of York's behaviour was even more unseemly as, surrounded each night at Brook's by a crowd of sycophants and office-seekers, he was giving imitations of the maniacal noises made by his father, which resembled the barking of a dog.
Roger had already heard of these shameful scenes in which the habitues of Brook's were giving vent to their hilarious joy at their prospects of becoming the rulers of the realm; but, on his expressing his disgust, the Prime Minister said gently:
"Speak not too harshly of the members of Brook's. There are many good fellows among them. I am a member myself, for that matter.
With his usual generosity Charles Fox put me up the very day I made my first speech in the House and, rather than repay so handsome a gesture by a slight, I have never resigned my membership."
They talked then of the future and Pitt announced quite calmly that he was preparing to resume his long-neglected practice at the Bar as a means of livelihood.
"But even in opposition your influence will be invaluable, Sir, in counteracting the evil, selfish policies of these rascals who will assume office," Roger expostulated. "Surely you will not be reduced to giving the greater part of your time to earning your own living?"
"I fear so," shrugged the Prime Minister. "Perhaps I should have feathered my nest while I had the chance. Less than a month ago I refused a gift of a hundred thousand pounds from the City, and during my administration I have used all the sinecures which fell vacant to pension men whom I felt deserved well of the nation, instead of taking any of them for myself. But I was prompted by the feeling that as long as my enemies could not accuse me of self-seeking, I was the better placed to conduct the country's business."
After dinner Roger gave an account of his travels, tactfully glossing over the more hectic of his adventures in deference to the presence of the prim churchman. When he had done the Prime Minister commended him kindly for his zeal, then went on to say:
"You need no longer concern yourself on Mr. Elliot's account. His colleague in Berlin, William Ewart, has succeeded in pulling King Gustavus's chestnuts out of the fire for him. Since last seeing you I have had a despatch to the effect that he has persuaded King Frederick Wilhelm of Prussia to issue a manifesto, stating that unless the Danes abandon their attack on Sweden he will despatch an army of sixteen thousand men to invade their province of Holstein."
Roger had been fretting badly about his inability to carry reassuring news to Hugh Elliot, so he was greatly relieved, and very pleased when Mr. Pitt continued: "As to yourself, you have more than justified my belief in your capabilities, and served us well by procuring such a definite statement of the Empress Catherine's views with regard to war. It seems that there is naught for it now but to curb her ambitions where e'er we may. But that is a task which I must leave to the opposition, for my days in office are clearly numbered."
"I take it, then, Sir, that you will not be able to employ me farther," Roger said, forgetful now of the horrors of the dungeon at Schlusselburg, and made miserable at the thought of this premature close to his promising career.
"I fear that is so, Mr. Brook," Pitt replied. "I would have liked to send you into France, for things are in a pretty tumult there; and a well-informed account as to King Louis's prospects of holding his own against his rebellious subjects would be of value to us. But circumstances deny me the privilege of availing myself of your abilities; though I trust you will allow me to continue to count myself among your friends."
"Indeed, Sir, I shall be greatly honoured," Roger bowed. "In any case, though, I was about to ask your leave to make a flying visit to Denmark, before receiving your instructions about other business. A personal matter requires my attention there, and I shall now set off as soon as I can secure a passage. Will you, perchance, have any missive that you would care for me to convey to Mr. Elliot?"
"Nay. I am too fully occupied with other matters to write to him just now. But I would be obliged if you would wait upon my Lord Carmarthen, at the Foreign Office, before your departure, as his Lordship may well have a despatch that he would like you to transmit." Roger naturally agreed and, soon after, took his leave.
On his ride back to London he was harrassed by a new worry. Before he left on his Russian mission he had been adequately financed by the Foreign Office, and had also had the nine-hundred guineas from the sale of Georgina's tiara; but his various journeyings and cutting a figure in the Northern capitals for five months had consumed nearly all his resources. He had enough money to reach Copenhagen and in the little chest he had left with Natalia there had been the equivalent of a hundred and thirty pounds. But he had sent her the key of it with his first letter, and the odds were that she had spent most of it by now. In any case they would be lucky if they had fifty guineas between them by the time they got back to England.
He had counted on taking Natalia with him when he was next sent to a foreign court, but there were to be no more missions at His Majesty's expense; and, with Mr. Pitt out of office, he might even have difficulty in securing a grant from the secret service funds which would reimburse him for his outlay while in Russia. He had only the three hundred a year that his father allowed him, and at near twenty-one had not so much as a foot on any ladder which might lead him to a lucrative post. Suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, he found himself faced with the frightening problem of how, in such straightened circumstances, he could possibly support an expensive wife like Natalia.
Equally unexpectedly, eight days later, it was solved for him. The first passage that he could get for Copenhagen was in a ship sailing on the 19th, so on the 17th he called on Lord Carmarthen. When he had made his bow, the Foreign Secretary said at once:
"Ah! Mr. Brook. I had you in mind but a short while ago. Scarcely an hour since we received a bag from Mr. Elliot, and in it there was a packet (for yourself. It cannot have been despatched yet, so I will have it sent for."
While the letter was being sought Lord Carmarthen gave him the latest news from Denmark. Between them Hugh Elliot and the Prussian envoy had browbeaten the Danes into agreeing to withdraw their forces from Swedish soil and to extending the armistice for six months, from the 13th of November.
"This is most excellent news," Roger smiled. "I take it, then, that your Lordship will require me to carry little except your congratulations to Mr. Elliot?"
The Marquess looked slightly uncomfortable. "You may tell him privately that both the Prime Minister and myself admire the part that he has played in this as a man. But we cannot publicly approve the language he has held towards the Danes. We had hoped to bring them also within the sphere of influence of the new alliance. By taking such a high tone with them he has jeopardised our prospects with them there, for the time being at least. Moreover, by exceeding his instructions, he might have left us facing two equally unpalatable alternatives; either to show most damaging weakness by repudiating him, or to accept the burden of an expensive and unpopular war."
"Indeed, my lord, Mr. Elliot did not exceed his instructions!" Roger exclaimed, springing to the defence of his friend. "For he told me himself that they were 'to prevent by every means any change in the relative situation of the Northern nations'. And 'tis due to his courage and audacity alone that the status quohas been maintained. Had you been with us in Sweden you would have had a better opportunity of realising that any but the strongest measures would have failed, and I take it ill that your lordship should now cavil at the conduct of a man who has so ably upheld the prestige of our country."
He might have received a sharp rebuke for his temerity, if, at that moment, a clerk had not entered with the letter for him. Having waited until the man had gone, Lord Carmarthen contented himself with remarking:
"While one may admire such vigorous personalities as those of Harris, Ewart and Elliot, when witnessing events from their comparatively limited horizons, the final judgment on their actions must be made at the centre of government; for from there alone can the whole scene be surveyed." Then he added a trifle col
dly: "No doubt you are anxious to read your letter, so please do not hesitate to do so."
With a murmur of thanks Roger broke the seal and scanned the first page, He could hardly have been more disconcerted had the paper burst into flames in his hands. Hugh Elliot broke the news as gently as he could and frankly assumed the blame of having been the prime cause of it, but the fact remained that on the 15th of October Natalia Andreovna had suddenly disappeared.
Elliot said that he would have informed Roger sooner, but for the fact that he had only just had the news himself in a letter from the Countess Reventlow which had been following him from place to place in Sweden. The Countess related that Natalia had been much shaken on receiving Roger's first letter, and she had carried the deserted wife home with her, insisting that she should accept her hospitality until Roger's return. After a few days Natalia had appeared reconciled to her situation, and had proved an interesting, if somewhat temperamental, guest. On October the 12th she had received Roger's second letter, from Gothenborg, which had caused her to give way to a fit of extreme rage. Next morning she had appeared pale but normal, then, three afternoons later, without saying a word to anyone about her intentions, she had driven into Copenhagen and vanished.
That her disappearance had been deliberate, and not the result of an accident or foul play, seemed proved beyond question by the fact that she had set off with a portmanteau which she had said contained a dress that she was taking into the town to have altered; yet, on the examination of her effects, it had transpired that not only were her travelling clothes missing but also all her jewels. So far no word had been received from her, and all efforts to trace her had proved unavailing.
Having read the letter through a second time more carefully Roger pulled himself together, informed Lord Carmarthen that the news he had received rendered it no longer necessary for him to go to Copenhagen, and bowed himself out.
Completely oblivious of a chill drizzle he walked across the parade ground at the back of the old Palace of Whitehall, endeavouring to analyse his feelings. He could not make up his mind whether he was glad or sorry about Natalia having in turn deserted him, and presumably for good. Ever since he had married her a conviction had steadily been growing in his mind that his honour was involved in making good his marriage-vows, and now events had deprived him of the chance of preserving his self-esteem by doing so. During their cruise down the Baltic he had come to feel a new affection for her and had begun to hope that they might find lasting happiness together.
On the other hand, once he had left the sphere of her personal magnetism, he had known within himself that his seeming contentment had been only a flash in the pan, brought about by the novelty of their regularised status and his own exhilaration at having escaped from Russia. Time could not really change Natalia's nature, and the ingrained brutality with which she treated servants would alone be enough to make life with her in England a constant anxiety. Last, but not least, he felt certain now that, in his changed circumstances, their marriage would have come to grief from his inability to provide her with at least some of the luxuries to which she had been accustomed ever since childhood.
That night he discussed the matter very fully with Droopy Ned. Over supper in a private room at the Cock Tavern they went into every aspect of it, and the foppish but shrewd Droopy expressed himself as frankly delighted. In his lazy drawl, he pointed out that whereas Natalia could not have divorced Roger for desertion, he could certainly divorce her. She would have to be traced and the business would take time and money, but within a year or so Roger would again be a free man, and he should thank his stars for such a merciful escape. *By that time Roger had reached a state in which he did not need much convincing of this. They drank seven bottles of Claret between them and went home very drunk, arm-in-arm.
Relieved now from the unpalatable task of having to tell his parents anything about his marriage, Roger set out next day for Lyrnington. He found that his father was from home, having been appointed by their Lordships of the Admiralty as the head of a Special Commission to investigate conditions at the Nore. Roger's mother, was, as usual, delighted to see her tall, brown boy, and he told her as much as he thought fit and proper for her to know about his adventures.
During the next few days he talked with dozens of his old friends among the shop-people in the little town, and visited at several of the larger houses in the neighbourhood, to find that the country folk were every bit as much perturbed by the King's illness and the premature end it would bring to Mr. Pitt's administration, as were the citizens of London.
There could be no doubt that in the five years since the ending of the American war, the King had won the love and respect of the vast majority of his subjects; and everyone agreed that it was young Billy Pitt's genius that had revived Britain from near bankruptcy to her present prosperity.
"Farmer" George and his Minister were both honest, frugal, clean-living men, and a pattern to the nation; whereas the Prince and his clique of depraved, unprincipled hangers-on typified the worst possible elements of the decadent Whig oligarchy. The Nonconformists, although the traditional opponents of the Royal prerogative, had begun to offer up prayers for the King's recovery in their chapels, spontaneously, over a week before the Established Church had formulated a prayer for the general use of its clergy. Even in the depths of the country the Tory squires knew of the excesses at Carlton House and Brook's; and dread of what would happen to the country if the King's dissolute sons, and men like Fox and Sheridan, got control of it, was now casting a gloom over the minds of rich and poor alike.
After ten days, made restless by the constant flow of rumours, and finding himself unable to settle down to anything, Roger decided to return to London. A talk with Droopy soon put him au courantwith the latest information.
On the 12th of November Pitt had proposed Jo the Prince that Parliament should be adjourned for a fortnight, and the Prince had agreed. On the 17th Pitt had asked leave to inform the Prince of the course he proposed to take on the re-assembling of Parliament, but an audience had been refused. On the 24th the Prince had at length inquired if Pitt had any proposals to make and the slighted Prime Minister had retaliated by sending a polite negative.
That same day Fox arrived back in London from Italy. The news of the King's affliction had reached him at Bologna and he had made the return trip in nine days, which was believed to be a record. To his fury he found that Sheridan was not only managing everything for the Prince but actually living in Mrs. Fitzherbert's house, as the bailiffs were in possession of his own. But, although ill from the strain of his journey, the corpulent and flamboyant statesman immediately threw himself into the battle to wrest power from the King's friends, with all his old genius for intrigue.
The struggle now centred round the question whether there were any hopes of the King's recovery or if he was permanently mad; as upon that hinged the form that the Regency should take. Dr. Warren, who was now the King's principal medical attendant, being a Whig and a strong supporter of the Prince, took the blackest view; and his bulletins were received with acclamation at Brook's, from which a virulent campaign of rumour was now launched to persuade the public that there was no chance of the King ever becoming sane again.
But Pitt was determined to protect the future rights of the helpless monarch by every means in his power, so he consulted his father's old friend Dr. Addington, and Addington advised the calling-in of the Reverend Dr. Willis, who, during twenty-eight years, had supervised some nine hundred cases of lunacy at a private asylum in Lincolnshire.
That the King still enjoyed periods of sanity was made clear when his new doctor was presented to him. On being informed that Willis was a clergyman he remarked that he could not approve a minister of the church taking to the practice of medicine. Willis replied that Christ went about healing the sick; to which the King promptly retorted: "Yes, but I never heard that he got seven hundred a year for doing so."
On the 29th the King was removed
to Kew, and Willis reported that he did not consider the case by any means hopeless. But the King's recovery, all hope of which was still denied by his other doctors, could not be expected, even if it occurred at all, for some time to come; so the arrangements to introduce a Regency Bill had to go on.
On December the 5th Pitt moved for a Committee to examine the physicians, and twenty-one members of the House, selected from both parties, were appointed. As was to be expected, the evidence of Doctors Warren and Willis conflicted to such a degree that their statements had little influence on their hearers' previous beliefs and prejudices.
On the 10th the Prime Minister presented the medical evidence and moved for a Committee to investigate precedents. Immediately Fox was on his feet with vehement protest. He denounced the proposal as merely a pretext for delay. The heir-apparent was of mature age and capacity. He had as clear a right to exercise the sovereign power during the King's illness as he would have in case of death. Parliament's only business was to determine when he should assume the reins of government, and that should be settled with the least possible delay.
In his impatience to pull down the government Fox had overreached himself, and the cool, logical brain of Pitt instantly seized upon his enemy's error. Turning to his neighbour he whispered: "I'll un-Whigthe gentleman for the rest of his life." Then he rose to his feet and tore the demagogue to shreds; asserting that he advocated a breach of the constitution by implying that the House had not even the right to debate the question.
From this a most extraordinary situation arose. The Whigs, who for well over a century had claimed to be the defenders of the people's liberties, gave their full backing to Fox in his attempt to re-assert the Divine Right of Hereditary Royalty; while the Tories, who had always sought to protect the Royal prerogative, had, over-night, become the champions of the duly elected representatives of the people in their established right to place a check upon the arbitrary powers of the sovereign.
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