Your party system is one of your thefts from our Church; your
National Convention is our OEcumenic Council; you abdicate
reason, as we do, before its decisions; and you yourself, Mr.
Ratcliffe, you are a Cardinal. They are able men, those cardinals; I
have known many; they were our best friends, but they were not
reformers. Are you a reformer, Mr. Senator?"
Ratcliffe grew to dread and hate the old man, but all his ordinary
tactics were powerless against this impenetrable eighteenth
century cynic. If he resorted to his Congressional practise of
browbeating and dogmatism, the Baron only smiled and turned his
back, or made some remark in French which galled his enemy all
the more, because, while he did not understand it, he knew well
that Madeleine did, and that she tried to repress her smile.
Ratcliffe's grey eyes grew colder and stonier than ever as he
gradually perceived that Baron Jacobi was carrying on a set
scheme with malignant ingenuity, to drive him out of Madeleine's
house, and he swore a terrible oath that he would not be beaten by
that monkey-faced foreigner. On the other hand Jacobi had little
hope of success: "What can an old man do?" said he with perfect
sincerity to Carrington; "If I were forty years younger, that great
oaf should not have his own way. Ah! I wish I were young again
and we were in Vienna!" From which it was rightly inferred by
Carrington that the venerable diplomatist would, if such acts were
still in fashion, have coolly insulted the Senator, and put a bullet
through his heart.
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