He didn't know!And there was that fellow Chamberlain!For James'political principles had been fixed between '70and '85when 'that rascally Radical'had been the chief thorn in the side of property and he distrusted him to this day in spite of his conversion;he would get the country into a mess and make money go down before he had done with it.A stormy petrel of a chap!Where was Soames?
He had gone to the funeral of course which they had tried to keep from him.He knew that perfectly well;he had seen his son's trousers.Roger!Roger in his coffin!He remembered how,when they came up from school together from the West,on the box seat of the old Slowflyer in 1824,Roger had got into the 'boot'and gone to sleep.James uttered a thin cackle.A funny fellow--Roger--an original!He didn't know!Younger than himself,and in his coffin!The family was breaking up.There was Val going to the university;he never came to see him now.He would cost a pretty penny up there.It was an extravagant age.And all the pretty pennies that his four grandchildren would cost him danced before James'eyes.He did not grudge them the money,but he grudged terribly the risk which the spending of that money might bring on them;he grudged the diminution of security.And now that Cicely had married,she might be having children too.He didn't know--couldn't tell!Nobody thought of anything but spending money in these days,and racing about,and having what they called 'a good time.'A motor-car went past the window.Ugly great lumbering thing,making all that racket!But there it was,the country rattling to the dogs!People in such a hurry that they couldn't even care for style--a neat turnout like his barouche and bays was worth all those new-fangled things.And consols at 116!There must be a lot of money in the country.And now there was this old Kruger!They had tried to keep old Kruger from him.But he knew better;there would be a pretty kettle of fish out there!He had known how it would be when that fellow Gladstone--dead now,thank God!made such a mess of it after that dreadful business at Majuba.