Mrs Craddock

by W. Somerset Maugham

  “It’s a ripping thing for me, isn’t it?”

  “But you’re not thinking of accepting?”

  “Not? Of course I am. What d’you think!”

  This was not an inquiry, but an exclamation.

  “You’ve never gone in for politics, you’ve never made a speech in your life.” She thought he would make an abject fool of himself, and for her sake, as well as his, decided to prevent him from standing. “He’s too stupid,” she thought.

  “What! I’ve made speeches at cricket dinners; you set me on my legs and I’ll say something.”

  “But this is different; you know nothing about the County Council.”

  “All you have to do is to look after steam-rollers and get glandered horses52 killed. I know all about it.”

  There is nothing so difficult as to persuade men that they are ignorant. Bertha, exaggerating the seriousness of the affair, thought it charlatanry to undertake a post without knowledge and without capacity. Fortunately that is not the opinion of the majority, or the government of this enlightened country could not proceed.

  “I should have thought you’d be glad to see me get a lift in the world,” said Edward.

  “I don’t want you to make a fool of yourself, Edward. You’ve told me often that you don’t go in for book-learning; and it can’t hurt your feelings when I say that you’re not very well informed. I don’t think it’s honest to take a position you’re not competent to fill.”

  “Me—not competent?” cried Edward with surprise. “That’s a good one. Upon my word, I’m not given to boasting, but I must say I think myself competent to do most things. You just ask old Bacot what he thinks of me, and that’ll open your eyes. The fact is, everyone appreciates me but you; but they say a man’s never a hero to his valet.”

  “Your proverb is most apt, dear Edward. But I have no intention of thwarting you in any of your plans. I only thought you didn’t know what you were going in for and that I might save you some humiliation.”

  “Humiliation, where? Oh, you think I shan’t get elected. Well, look here, I bet you any money you like that I shall come out top of the poll.”

  Next day Edward wrote to Mr Bacot expressing pleasure that he was able to fall in with the views of the Conservative Association; and Bertha, who knew that no argument could turn him from his purpose, determined to coach him, so that he should not make too arrant a fool of himself. Her fears were proportionate to her estimate of Edward’s ability. She sent to London for pamphlets and blue-books on the rights and duties of the County Council, and begged Edward to read them. But in his self-confident manner he pooh-poohed her, and laughed when she read them herself in order to be able to teach him.

  “I don’t want to know all that rot,” he cried. “All a man wants is gumption. Why, d’you suppose a man who goes in for Parliament knows anything about politics? Of course he doesn’t.”

  Bertha was indignant that her husband should be so satisfied in his own ignorance that he stoutly refused to learn. Happily men don’t realize how stupid they are, or half the world would commit suicide. Knowledge is a will-of-the-wisp, fluttering ever out of the traveller’s reach; and a weary journey must be endured before it is even seen. It is only when a man knows a good deal that he discovers how unfathomable is his ignorance. The man who knows nothing is satisfied that there is nothing to know, consequently that he knows everything; and you may more easily persuade him that the moon is made of green cheese than that he is not omniscient. The County Council elections in London were being held just then, and Bertha, hoping to give Edward useful hints, diligently read the oratory that they occasioned. But he refused to listen to her.

  “I don’t want to crib other men’s stuff. I’m going to talk on my own.”

  “Why don’t you write out a speech and get it by heart?”

  Bertha fancied that so she might influence him a little and spare herself and him the humiliation of utter ridicule.

  “Old Bacot says when he makes a speech he always trusts to the spur of the moment. He says that Fox53 made his best speeches when he was blind drunk.”

  “D’you know who Fox was?” asked Bertha.

  “Some old buffer or other who made speeches.”

  The day arrived when Edward was to make his first address in the Blackstable town hall; and for days placards had been pasted on every wall and displayed in every shop announcing the glad news. Mr Bacot came to Court Leys, rubbing his hands.

  “We shall have a full house. It’ll be a big success. The hall will hold four hundred people, and I think there won’t be standing room. I daresay you’ll have to address an overflow meeting at the Forester’s Hall afterwards.”

  “I’ll address any number of meetings you like,” replied Edward.

  Bertha grew more and more nervous. She anticipated a horrible collapse; they did not know—as she did—how limited was Edward’s intelligence. She wanted to stay at home in order to avoid the ordeal, but Mr Bacot had reserved for her a prominent seat on the platform.

  “Are you nervous, Eddie?” she said, feeling more kindly disposed to him from his approaching trial.

  “Me—nervous? What have I got to be nervous about?”

  The hall was indeed crammed with the most eager, smelly, enthusiastic crowd Bertha had ever seen. The gas-jets flared noisily, throwing ugly lights on the people, sailors, shopkeepers and farm hands. On the platform in a semi-circle like the immortal gods sat the notabilities of the neighbourhood; they were Conservative to the backbone. Bertha looked round with apprehension, but tried to calm herself with the thought that they were stupid people and she had no cause to tremble before them.

  Presently the vicar took the chair, and in a few well-chosen words introduced Mr Craddock.

  “Mr Craddock, like good wine, needs no bush.54 You all know him, and an introduction is superfluous. Still it is customary on such an occasion to say a few words on behalf of the candidate, and I have great pleasure, etc., etc. . . .”

  Now Edward rose to his feet, and Bertha’s blood ran cold. She dared not look at the audience. He advanced with his hands in his pockets; he had insisted on dressing himself up in a frock-coat and the most dismal pepper-and-salt trousers.

  “Mr Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, unaccustomed to public speaking as I am. . . .”

  Bertha looked up with a start. Could a man at the end of the nineteenth century seriously begin an oration with those words? But he was not joking; he went on gravely, and looking round, Bertha caught not the shadow of a smile. Edward was not in the least nervous; he quickly got into the swing of his speech: it was awful! He introduced every hackneyed phrase he knew, he mingled slang incongruously with pompous language, and his silly jokes, chestnuts of great antiquity, made Bertha sweat coldly. She wondered that he could go on with such self-possession; did he not see that he was making himself perfectly absurd? She dared not look up for fear of catching the sniggers of Mrs Branderton and the Hancocks: “One sees what he was before he married Miss Ley. Of course, he’s a quite uneducated man. I wonder his wife didn’t prevent him from making such an exhibition of himself. The grammar of it, my dear; and the jokes and the stories!” Bertha clenched her hands, furious because the flush of shame would not leave her cheeks. The speech was even worse than she had expected. He used the longest words and, getting entangled in his own verbosity, was obliged to leave his sentence unfinished. He began a period with an elaborate flourish and waddled in confusion to the tamest commonplace; he was like a man who set out to explore the Andes and then, changing his mind, took a stroll in the Burlington Arcade.55 How long would it be, asked Bertha, before the audience broke into jeers and hisses? She blessed them for their patience. And what would happen afterwards? Would Mr Bacot ask Edward to withdraw his candidature? And supposing Edward refused, would it be necessary to tell him that he was really too great a fool? Bertha heard already the covert sneers of her neighbours.

  “Oh, I wish he’d finish!” she muttered between her teeth. The agony, th
e humiliation of it, were unendurable.

  But Edward was still talking and gave no sign of an approaching termination. Bertha thought miserably that he had always been long-winded; if he would only sit down quickly the failure might not be irreparable. He made a vile pun, and everyone cried, “Oh! Oh!” Bertha shivered and set her teeth, she must bear it to the end now. Why wouldn’t he sit down? Then Edward told an agricultural story, and the audience shouted with laughter. A ray of hope came to Bertha; perhaps his vulgarity might save him with the vulgar people who formed the great body of the audience. But what must the Brandertons and the Molsons and the Hancocks and all the rest of them be saying? They must utterly despise him.

  But worse was to follow. Edward came to his peroration, and a few remarks on current politics (of which he knew nothing) brought him to his country, England, Home and Beauty. He turned the tap of patriotism full on; it gurgled out in a stream. He blew the penny trumpets of English purity, and the tin whistles of the British Empire, and he beat the big drum of the great Anglo-Saxon race. He thanked God he was an Englishman, and not as others are. Tommy Atkins56 and Jack Tar57 and Mr Rudyard Kipling danced a jig to the strains of the “British Grenadiers” and Mr Joseph Chamberlain58 executed a pas seul59 to the tune of “Yankee Doodle.” Metaphorically he waved the Union Jack.

  The sentimentality and the bad taste and the vulgarity of what he said revolted Bertha; it was horrible to think how absolutely common must be the mind of a man who could foul his mouth with the expression of such sentiments.

  He sat down. For one moment the audience were silent and then with one throat broke into thunderous applause. It was no perfunctory clapping of hands; they rose as one man and shouted and yelled with enthusiasm.

  “Good old Teddy,” cried a voice. And then the air was filled with “For he’s a jolly good fellow.” Mrs Branderton stood on a chair and waved her handkerchief, Miss Glover clapped her hands as if she were no longer an automaton.

  “Wasn’t it perfectly splendid?” she whispered to Bertha.

  Everyone on the platform was in a frenzy of delight. Mr Bacot warmly shook Edward’s hand. Mrs Mayston Ryle fanned herself desperately. The scene might well have been described, in the language of journalists, as one of unparalleled enthusiasm. Bertha was dumbfounded.

  Mr Bacot jumped to his feet.

  “I must congratulate Mr Craddock on his excellent speech. I am sure it comes as a surprise to all of us that he should prove such a fluent speaker, with such a fund of humour and common-sense. And what is more valuable than these, his last words have proved to us that his heart—his heart, gentlemen—is in the right place, and that is saying a great deal. In fact I know nothing better to be said of a man than that his heart is in the right place. You know me, ladies and gentlemen, I have made many speeches to you since I had the honour of standing for the constituency in ’85, but I must confess I couldn’t make a better speech myself than the one you have just heard.”

  “You could—you could!” cried Edward, modestly.

  “No, Mr Craddock. No, I assert deliberately and I mean it, that I could not do better myself. From my shoulders I let fall the mantle, and give it—”

  Here Mr Bacot was interrupted by the stentorian voice of the landlord of “The Pig and Whistle” (a rabid Conservative).

  “Three cheers for good old Teddy!”

  “That’s right, my boys,” cried Mr Bacot, for once taking an interruption in good part, “three cheers for good old Teddy!”

  The audience opened its mighty mouth and roared, and then burst again into “For he’s a jolly good fellow.” Arthur Branderton, when the tumult was subsiding, rose from his chair and called for more cheers. The object of all this enthusiasm sat calmly, with a well-satisfied look on his face, taking it all with his usual modest complacency. At last the meeting broke up, with cheers and “God Save the Queen,” and “He’s a jolly good fellow.” The committee and the personal friends of the Craddocks retired to the side room for light refreshment.

  The ladies clustered round Edward, congratulating him. Arthur Branderton came to Bertha.

  “Ripping speech, wasn’t it?” he said. “I had no idea he could jaw like that. By Jove, it simply stirred me right through.”

  Before Bertha could answer, Mrs Mayston Ryle sailed in.

  “Where’s the man?” she cried in her loud voice. “Where is he? Show him to me. My dear Mr Craddock, your speech was perfect. I say it.”

  “And in such good taste,” said Miss Hancock, her eyes glowing. “How proud you must be of your husband, Mrs Craddock!”

  “There’s no chance for the Radicals now,” said the vicar, rubbing his hands.

  “Oh, Mr Craddock, let me come near you,” cried Mrs Branderton. “I’ve been trying to get at you for twenty minutes. You’ve simply extinguished the horrid Radicals. I couldn’t help crying, you were so pathetic.”

  “One may say what one likes,” whispered Miss Glover to her brother, “but there’s nothing in the world so beautiful as sentiment. I felt my heart simply bursting.”

  “Mr Craddock,” added Mrs Mayston Ryle, “you’ve pleased me! Where’s your wife, that I may tell her so?”

  “It’s the best speech we’ve ever had down here,” cried Mrs Branderton.

  “That’s the only true thing I’ve heard you say for twenty years, Mrs Branderton,” replied Mrs Mayston Ryle, looking very hard at Mr Atthill Bacot.

  26

  When Lord Rosebery60 makes a speech, even the journals of his own party report him in the first person and at full length; and this is said to be the politician’s supreme ambition: when he has reached such distinction there is nothing left him but an honourable death and a public funeral in Westminster Abbey. Now, the Blackstable Times accorded this honour to Edward’s first speech, it was printed with numberless I’s peppered boldly over it, the grammar was corrected, and the stops inserted just as for the most important orators. Edward bought a dozen copies and read the speech right through in each, to see that his sentiments were correctly expressed and that there were no misprints. He gave it to Bertha and stood over her while she read it.

  “Looks well, don’t it?” he said.

  “Splendid!”

  “By the way, is Aunt Polly’s address 72 Eliot Mansions?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  Her jaw fell as she saw him roll up half a dozen copies of the Blackstable Times and address the wrapper.

  “I’m sure she’d like to read my speech. And it might hurt her feelings if she heard about it and I’d not sent her the report.”

  “Oh, I’m sure she’d like to see it very much. But if you send six copies you’ll have none left—for other people.”

  “Oh, I can easily get some more. The Editor chap told me I could have a thousand if I liked. I’m sending her six because I daresay she’d like to forward some to her friends.”

  Almost by return of post came Miss Ley’s reply.

  MY DEAR EDWARD,

  I perused all six copies of your speech with the greatest interest; and I think you will agree with me that it is high proof of its merit that I was able to read it the sixth time with as unflagging attention as the first. The peroration, indeed, I am convinced that no acquaintance could stale. It is so true that “every Englishman has a mother” (supposing, of course, that an untimely death has not robbed him of her). It is curious how one does not realize the truth of some things till they are set before one; when one’s only surprise is at not having seen them before I hope it will not offend you if I suggest that Bertha’s handiwork seems to me not invisible in some of the sentiments (especially in that passage about the Union Jack); did you really write the whole speech yourself? Come, now, confess that Bertha helped you.

  Yours very sincerely,

  Mary Ley.

  Edward read the letter and tossed it, laughing, to Bertha.

  “What cheek her suggesting that you helped me! I like that.”

  “I’ll write at once and tell her that it was all your
own.”

  Bertha still could hardly believe genuine the admiration that her husband excited. Knowing his extreme incapacity, she was astounded that the rest of the world should think him an uncommonly clever fellow. To her his pretensions were merely ridiculous; she marvelled that he should venture to discuss with dogmatic glibness subjects of which he knew nothing; but she marvelled still more that people should be impressed thereby; he had an astonishing faculty for concealing his ignorance.

  At last the polling-day arrived, and Bertha waited anxiously at Court Leys for the result. Edward eventually appeared, radiant.

  “What did I tell you?” said he.

  “I see you’ve got in.”

  “Got in isn’t the word for it! What did I tell you? My dear girl, I’ve simply knocked ’em all into a cocked hat. I got double the number of votes that the other chap did, and it’s the biggest poll they’ve ever had. Aren’t you proud that your hubby is a County Councillor? I tell you I shall be an M.P. before I die.”

  “I congratulate you with all my heart,” said Bertha trying to be enthusiastic.

  Edward in his excitement did not observe her coolness. He was walking up and down the room concocting schemes, asking himself how long it would be before Miles Campbell, the member, was confronted by the inevitable dilemma of the unopposed M.P., one horn of which is the kingdom of Heaven and the other the House of Lords.

  Presently he stopped: “I’m not a vain man,” he remarked, “but I must say I don’t think I’ve done badly.”

  * * *

  Edward for a while was somewhat overwhelmed by his own greatness, but the opinion came to his rescue that the rewards were only according to his deserts; and presently he entered energetically into the not very arduous duties of the County Councillor. Bertha continually expected to hear something to his disadvantage; but on the contrary everything seemed to proceed very satisfactorily, and Edward’s aptitude for business, his keenness in making a bargain, his common-sense, were heralded abroad in a manner that should have been most gratifying to his wife. But as a matter of fact these constant praises exceedingly disquieted Bertha. She asked herself uneasily whether she was doing him an injustice. Was he really as clever, had he indeed the virtues that common report ascribed to him? Perhaps she was prejudiced, and perhaps—he was cleverer than she. The possibility of this made her wince; she had never doubted that her intellect was superior to Edward’s; their respective knowledge was not comparable; she occupied herself with thoughts that Edward did not conceive. He never interested himself in abstract things, and his conversation was tedious as only the absence of speculation can make it. It was extraordinary that everyone but she should so highly esteem his intelligence. Bertha knew that his mind was paltry and his ignorance egregious. His pretentiousness made him a charlatan. One day he came to her, his head full of a new idea.