"We did not know he was standing at the time," said Jack rather feebly. "Doubtless. But the secret of success in this world is not to make blunders where one does not know. Any one can avoid blunders if he knows everything. In any case, here is the position. It is sedulously circulated that your wife has an intrigue with Jim Spencer. And who circulates it? This cook! Luckily I did something to stop people talking." "What was that?" "I told them I happened to know that Mildred had quarrelled with your wife, and had invented this story out of revenge. That is the case, is it not?" "It certainly happens to be true. But I don't see how you knew." "I guessed it was so," said Lady Ardingly. "It was the only reasonable supposition. There is not another which holds water. Besides, if it had not been true, what does it matter? Now, this is the first way in which Mildred might have ruined you. The second concerns you also." "I don't think we need discuss that," said Jack, who kept his temper only by the knowledge that he would lose a great deal more if he lost it. "But we had better. You are a decent fellow, Jack; also it will amuse me to see you in the Cabinet, which I shall not, unless you are careful. Now, you have had an affair with Mildred for many years. At least, so we all suppose; that we all suppose it is the important thing. I do not mind that, morally speaking, because I am in no way responsible for your morals. It is your own business. She happens to stimulate you. Everybody knows about it except one person--your wife. Now, why not tell her?" "For what reason?" asked Jack, far too much surprised to resent anything. "Simply for fear she should find out, and--and blow your ships out of the water!" said Lady Ardingly. "You have fallen into a grave mistake. You have treated your wife as a negligible quantity, whereas hardly anybody is a negligible quantity, and certainly not she. That is by the way. At present we are considering your career. Now, if Marie finds out, either while you are still not yet in the Cabinet, or even after that, before you have made yourself clearly felt to be indispensable, you go. For if the middle class gets hold of a scandal about a Minister, not yet proven, that man is beyond hope. He cannot weather the storm. The middle class, who are, after all, the people, distrust his public measures because they disapprove of his private life." "Idiotic on their part," observed Jack. "No doubt; but the cause of success is to estimate correctly and to take advantage of the idiocy of others. None of us are clever in the way Napoleon was clever. All we can do is to be slightly less idiotic than the rest of mankind. Now you must go. I have a hundred things to do and a thousand people to see. If I can be of any further help to you, let me know." Jack got up, then paused, indecisive. "You mean you will tell Marie?" he asked. "If you wish me to. But there is a simpler plan." "What is that?" asked Jack.