Charles Snow - The Conscience of the Rich

‘Quite convinced,’ I said.

‘I accept that,’ said Sir Philip. ‘And it makes me certain that the whole campaign is a put-up job and there’s no backing to it at all.’

Mr March, who had been listening with painful attention, showed no relief as he heard these words. He looked at his brother, with an expression stupefied, harassed, distressed.

‘That being so,’ I said, ‘your solicitors are telling you to go ahead with a libel action, aren’t they?’

‘It’s not quite so easy,’ Sir Philip replied without hesitation, in a tone as authoritative as before. I admired his hard competence. Professionally, I thought, he would have been an ideal client. ‘They’ve tied up this affair with certain other transactions. The other transactions are supposed to have happened when I was in the government in 1929. You will notice that, in the case of Getliffe, they have taken care to tie these two allegations together. It is clever of them. I detest their politics, I’ve no use for their general attitude, and if I can put them in their place, I shall — but we mustn’t imagine that we are dealing with fools.’

‘I have never thought so,’ said Mr March.

‘If they go ahead with these allegations about last year, I should win a libel action, shouldn’t I?’ Sir Philip asked me.

‘Without the slightest doubt,’ I said.

‘I should also do myself more harm than good,’ he went on.

I was thinking how precisely Seymour had calculated the risk.

‘There happens to be some substance in what they say about 1929,’ said Sir Philip.

We waited for him to go on.

‘I may say at once that I’ve done nothing which men of decent judgement could think improper. But one step I took in good faith which these people may twist against me. I am very much to blame for giving them such a handle. I’ve always thought it was not only essential to be honest: it was also essential to seem honest. I take all the blame for not seeing further than my nose. That is the only blame I am disposed to take.’

He paused, and gave a sardonic chuckle.

‘I should like to distinguish my actions from Getliffe’s quite sharply. In 1929 Getliffe made a disgraceful use of information he had acquired professionally. In my judgement, there is no question of it. He knew the government were giving a contract to Howard & Hazlehurst. He used catspaws to buy a fair-sized block of shares. He must have done very well out of it. Howard & Hazlehurst were down to 9s. in 1929: they stand at 36s. today.’

‘Thirty-six and sixpence,’ said Mr March, as though by sheer habit.

‘Getliffe is a twister and I shouldn’t have the faintest compunction about going ahead with a libel action if it only meant involving him. If he were disbarred, I should simply consider that he had brought it on himself. He’s downright dishonest, and I was sorry that you’ — he turned to Mr March — ‘permitted Katherine to marry into the fellow’s family. Though I’ve always liked Francis from the little I’ve seen of him.’

Mr March burst out, in violent and excessive anger: ‘I refuse to accept that criticism at the present juncture. My son-in-law has made an excellent husband for my daughter Katherine in all respects. I refused at the time to penalize them on account of his regrettable connections, and I still refuse, despite the fact that Herbert Getliffe’s name is linked with yours in these deplorable circumstances. I refuse to accept this preposterous criticism. If other marriages in my family had been as sound as my daughter’s, we should not be troubled with the discussion on which we are supposed to be engaged.’

Sir Philip seemed to understand his brother’s rage.

‘Yes, Leonard,’ he said, with an awkward, constrained affection. ‘But you can appreciate that Getliffe isn’t my favourite character just at present, can’t you?’ His tone became once more efficient, organized, businesslike. ‘My own activities were considerably different from that fellow’s. I only spent a few months in the government in 1929, you may remember, but of course I knew of the Howard & Hazlehurst contract, and of course I knew of the trend of policy about armaments. Naturally I thought over the implications, which appeared to suggest that, even at the height of disarmament, certain types of weapon would still have to be developed. So certain firms connected with those types of weapon would flourish for the next few years. That wasn’t a foolish piece of reasoning, and I felt entitled to act on it. If one struck lucky, one had a good buy. I looked round at various firms. I found one which was in fairly low water, and I backed my guess. The shares were down somewhere that didn’t matter, and I put in a fairish sum of money. My guess came off, but I should have preferred it otherwise. For this firm was bought by Howard & Hazlehurst three months after I had put my money in. I had no conceivable foreknowledge of that transaction. I did very well out of it, from the nature of the case. So did one or two of my colleagues, who sometimes follow my guidance in financial matters. It’s apparent that an ugly construction would be put on our actions — and these people are putting it. The facts are as I have stated them.’

He looked at Mr March and me in turn.

‘I know there are silly persons who, without imputing motives, would still think that what Getliffe and I did were very much the same. I find those silly persons both tiresome and stupid. The point is that Getliffe acted in a way which the rules don’t permit, while I kept strictly inside them. That is the only point. There are no absolute principles in these matters. There are simply rules on which all financial dealings depend. If you upset them, you upset the whole structure. If the rules go, then confidence and stability go. That is why I should show no mercy to anyone who breaks them. I should be sorry to see Getliffe escape scot-free.’

He added: ‘It would not have occurred to me to break the rules. I blame myself for giving the appearance of having done so. I have had a long life in these matters, and I have never taken part in a transaction of which I am ashamed. The only thing left is to stop this business before it goes further. I want to ask you whether that is in our power.’

His conscience was clear, his self-respect untouched. Mr March had reported, after visiting him when ill, that his brother was ‘sick in mind’; but it was not through any inner conflict. He was certain of his integrity. Yet he was desperately taxed. He was an old man, threatened with humiliation. In his hard, simple, strong-willed fashion he had coiled himself up to meet the danger. Throughout the afternoon he had kept his authority. But as he asked ‘whether that is in our power’ his face was shrunken: he still controlled his tone, but he looked imploring.

I saw that Mr March was stricken by this change. All through the afternoon, he had been torn by a sorrow his brother did not know; but even without that, he would still have flinched from the sight of Philip turning to him for pity and help. It had been painful to him to see the first traces of Philip’s anxiety, when he was ill: it was worse now. For Philip had been the hero of his childhood, the brother who did all that he would have liked to do, the brother who had none of his timidities, who was self-sufficient, undiffident, effective: it was intolerable to see him weak. It filled Mr March with revulsion, even with anger against Philip.

Mr March said in a low voice to his brother: ‘As I’ve already told you, whether it is in our power or not depends on my son’s wife.’

‘I still don’t believe it,’ said Sir Philip.

‘Will you tell my brother whether she’s responsible for this, or not?’ said Mr March to me.

‘How much do you know about this?’ Sir Philip asked me.