human
Couldn't believe it when you told me over the telephone, he said.
gpt
I congratulate you both heartily. What about Leeds, Dartrey?
human
Splendid!
gpt
It's the end, I suppose?
human
Absolutely! That is why I telephoned for you. Horlock is quite resigned. I understand that they will send for me, but I wish to tell you, Miller, as I have just told Tallente, that I have finally made up my mind that it would not be in the best interests of our party for me to attempt to form a Ministry myself. I am therefore passing the task on to Tallente. Here is a list of what we propose.
gpt
Do I understand that Tallente is to be Prime Minister?
human
Certainly! You see I have put you down for the Home Office, Sargent as Chancellor of the Exchequer, Saunderson--
gpt
I don't want to hear any more, Miller interrupted.
human
It's time we had this out. I object to Tallente being placed at the head of the party.
gpt
And why?
human
Because he is a newcomer and has done nothing to earn such a position, Miller declared;
gpt
What do you mean by saying that I am not a people's man?
human
Just what the words indicate, was the almost fierce reply.
gpt
You're Eton and Oxford, not board-school and apprentice. Your brain brings you to the cause of the people, not your heart. You aren't one of us and never could be. You're an aristocrat, and before we knew where we were, you'd be legislating for aristocrats. You'd try and sneak them into your Cabinet. It's their atmosphere you've been brought up in. It's with them you want to live. That's what I mean when I say that you're not a people's man, Tallente, and I defy any one to say that you are.
human
Miller, Dartrey intervened earnestly,
gpt
Then I am content to remain a fool, Miller rejoined.
human
Once and for all, I decline to serve under Tallente, and I warn you that if you put him forward, if you go so far, even, as to give him a seat in the Cabinet of the Government it is your job to form, you will disunite the party and bring calamity upon us.
gpt
Have you any further reason for your attitude, Tallente asked pointedly,
human
I have,
gpt
State it now, then, please.
human
I make my appeal to you, Dartrey, he said.
gpt
You have put forward this man as your choice of a leader of the great Democratic Party, the party which is to combine all branches of Labour, the party which is to stand for the people. I charge him with having written in the last year of the war a scathing attack upon the greatest of British institutions, the trades unions, an article written from the extreme aristocratic standpoint, an article which, if published to-day and distributed broadcast amongst the miners and operatives of the north, would result in a revolution if his name were persisted in.
human
I have read everything Tallente has ever written, and I have never come across any such article,
gpt
You have never come across it because it was never published, Miller continued,
human
Is this true, Tallente?
gpt
Perfectly. I admit the existence of the article and I admit that it was written with all the vigour I could command, on the lines quoted by Miller. Since, however, it was never published, it can surely be treated as nonexistent?
human
That is just what it cannot be, Miller declared.
gpt
The signed manuscript of that article is in the hands of those who would rather see it published than have Tallente Prime Minister.
human
Blackmail,
gpt
You can call it what you please, was the sneering reply.
human
The facts are as I have stated them.
gpt
But what in the world could have induced you to write such an article, Tallente? Dartrey demanded.
human
Your attitude towards Labour, even when you were in the Coalition Cabinet, was perfectly sound.
gpt
It was more than sound, it was sympathetic, Tallente insisted.
human
That is why I worked myself into the state of indignation which induced me to write it. I will not defend it. It is sufficient to remind you both that when we were hard pressed, when England really had her back to the wall, when coal was the very blood of life to her, a strike was declared in South Wales and received the open sympathy of the faction with which this man Miller here is associated. Miller has spoken plainly about me. Let him hear what I have to say about him. He went down to South Wales to visit these miners and he encouraged them in a course of action which, if other industries had followed suit, would have brought this country into slavery and disgrace. And furthermore, let me remind you of this, Dartrey. It was Miller's branch of the Labour Party who sent him to Switzerland to confer with enemy Socialists and for the last eighteen months of the war he practically lived under the espionage of our secret service--a suspected traitor.
gpt
It's a lie!
human
It is the truth and easily proved, Tallente retorted.
gpt
When peace came, however, Miller's party altered their tactics and the hatchet was to have been buried. My article was directed against the trades unions as they were at that time, not as they are to-day, and I still claim that if public opinion had not driven them into an arrangement with the Government, my article would have been published and would have done good. To publish it now could answer no useful purpose. Its application is gone and the conditions which prompted its tone disappeared.
human
I am beginning to understand, Dartrey admitted.
gpt
Tell me, how did the manuscript ever leave your possession, Tallente?
human
I will tell you, Tallente replied, pointing over at Miller.
gpt
Because that man paid Palliser, my secretary, five thousand pounds out of his secret service money to obtain possession of it.
human
Who told you that lie?
gpt
It's no lie--it's the truth, Tallente rejoined.
human
You used five thousand pounds of secret service money to gratify a private spite.
gpt
That's false, anyhow, Miller retorted.
human
I have no personal spite against you, Tallente. I look upon you as a dangerous man in our party, and if I have sought for means to remove you from it, it has been not from personal feeling, but for the good of the cause.
gpt
There stands your leader, Tallente continued.
human
Did you consult him before you bribed my secretary and hawked about that article, first to Horlock and now to heaven knows whom?
gpt
It is the first I have heard of it,
human
Just so. It goes to prove what I have declared before--that Miller's attack upon me is a personal one.
gpt
And I deny it, Miller exclaimed fiercely.
human
I don't like you, Tallente, I hate your class and I distrust your presence in the ranks of the Democratic Party. Against your leadership I shall fight tooth and nail. Dartrey, he went on,