All knew that it was
over; and Lady St Julians, giving up her quadrille, began to
look about for seats in parliament for her sons.
"What a happiness it is to have a clever mother," exclaimed
Egremont, as he pondered over the returns of his election
agent. Lady Marney, duly warned of the impending catastrophe,
was experiencing all the advantages of prior information. It
delighted her to meet Lady St Julians driving distractedly
about town, calling at clubs, closeted with red tapers, making
ingenious combinations that would not work, by means of which
some one of her sons was to stand in coalition with some rich
parvenu; to pay none of the expenses and yet to come in first.
And all this time, Lady Marney, serene and smiling, had the
daily pleasure of assuring Lady St Julians what a relief it
was to her that Charles had fixed on his place. It had been
arranged indeed these weeks past; "but then, you know,"
concluded Lady Marney in the sweetest voice and with a
blandishing glance, "I never did believe in that hay fever."
In the meantime the impending event changed the whole aspect
of the political world. The king dying before the new
registration was the greatest blow to pseudo-toryism since his
majesty, calling for a hackney coach, went down and dissolved
parliament in 1831.
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