Japhet Williams. Something of this had been foreshadowed by Mr. Foster's
account of his friend, but the reality went far beyond. Japhet was a
small fretful-faced man; he was rich, liberal, and kind, but he plumed
himself on a scrupulous conscience and was the slave of a trifle-ridden
mind. As a member of a party, then, he was hard to work with, harder even
than Weston Marchmont, of whom he seemed sometimes to May to be a reduced
and travestied copy. Not a speech could be made, not a bill issued, but
Japhet Williams flew round to the Committee Room with an objection to
urge and a hole to pick. There he would find large, stout, shrewd old
Foster, installed in an arm-chair and ready with native diplomacy, or
Quisante himself, earning Mrs. Baxter's nickname of "Mr. Reasons" by the
suave volubility of his explanations. May laughed at such scenes
half-a-dozen times in the first week of her stay at Henstead.
"Is he so very important to us?" she asked of Foster.
He answered her in a whisper behind a fat hand,
"His house is only a couple of miles from Sir Winterton's, and Lady
Mildmay's been civil.
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