For his father and his brother, and for many in London too, a failure in the market was a kind of success, and a success in the market a matter not to be discussed. He did not ever in his life actively seek the hard doom of general popularity. Nonetheless, he wanted his books to sell, he wanted to shine in the marketplace and pocket the proceeds without compromising his sacred art in any way.

It mattered to him how he was seen; and being seen not to lift a finger to make his works popular pleased him; being seen to devote himself in solitude and selfless application to a noble art gave him satisfaction. He recognized, however, that lack of success was one thing, but abject failure was another. Thus his failure in the theatre, so public, so notorious and so transparent, managed to make him uneasy in company and unwilling to venture much into the wider world of London society. He felt like a general who had come back from a battlefield complete with a scent of defeat, and whose presence in the warm bright rooms of London would seem incongruous and unhappy.

He knew military men in London. He had moved carefully and easily among the powerful, and he had listened with close attention to the English talk about political intrigue and military valour. As he sat amid the usual collection of rich accessories and old warriors at Lord Wolseley’s house in Portman Square, he often thought of what his sister Alice or his brother William would say if they heard the densest of imperial war talk after dinner, the deep and hearty discussions about troops and attacks and slaughter. Alice had been the most anti-imperialist of the family; she had even loved Parnell and longed for Home Rule for Ireland. William had his Irish sentiments too and indeed his anti-English attitudes.

Lord Wolseley was cultivated, as all of them were, and he was well-mannered and fascinating with rosy dimples and piercing eyes. Henry was in the company of these men because their wives wished him to be. The women liked his manners and his grey eyes and his American origin, but more than anything they enjoyed his way of listening, of drinking in every word, asking only pertinent questions, acknowledging by his gestures and replies the intelligence of his interlocutor.

It was easier for him if there were no other writers present, no one who knew his work. The men who gathered after dinner for anecdotes and political gossip never interested him as much as what they said interested him; the women, on the other hand, always interested him, no matter what they said. Lady Wolseley interested him a great deal because she was all cleverness and sympathy and charm and had the air and manners and taste of an American. She had the habit of surveying the room in wonder and open admiration for her guests, and then turning her smile on her closest companion and speaking quietly as though imparting a secret.

He needed to leave London, but he did not think that he could bear to be alone anywhere. He did not want to discuss his play and he did not think he could work. He determined that if he travelled things would be different on his return. His mind was full of visions and ideas. He prayed and hoped that his imagination might be equal to pages written. That was all he wanted, he now believed.

He went to Ireland since it was easy to travel there and because he did not believe it would strain his nerves. Neither Lord Houghton, the new Lord Lieutenant, whose father he had also known, nor Lord Wolseley, who had become Commander-in-Chief of Her Majesty’s forces in Ireland, had seen his play; he agreed to spend a week with each. He had been surprised by the vehemence of the invitations and the tussle between the two as to how much time he would spend with one and how much with the other. It was only when he was installed in Dublin Castle that he understood the problem.

Ireland was in a state of unrest and Her Majesty’s government had not merely failed to put down the unrest but given in to it by making concessions. These had been relatively easy to explain to Parliament but impossible to explain to the Irish landlords and local garrisons, who were boycotting all the social events of the season at Dublin Castle. Lord Houghton was depending on imported guests and this explained the enthusiasm of his invitation.

While old Lord Houghton had been informal in both his manners and his personal habits, and given especially in his later years to delighting himself and amusing others, his son was stern and self-important. In his position as Lord Lieutenant, the new Lord Houghton had found true happiness. He strutted about the place, being the only one it seemed not to realize that while he meant well, he did not matter. He represented the queen in Ireland, and he did so with all the ceremony and attention to detail he could muster, filling his day with inspections and receptions and salutes and his evening with balls and banquets. He oversaw his household as though the queen were in residence and likely to appear at this very moment in all her imperial grandeur.

The little viceregal court in all its pomposity was, for Henry, a weariness to flesh and spirit alike. There were four balls in six days and a banquet every night. The bare official and military class peopled them, with the aid of a very dull and second-rate, though large, house party from England. Fortunately, most of the guests had never heard of him; he made no effort to alter that.

‘Now my advice to you,’ one of the English ladies said to him, ‘is to hold your nose and close your eyes and if you can find a way to stuff your ears do so as well. Begin the moment you arrive in Ireland and don’t stop until you enter the castle or the viceregal lodge or wherever you are staying.’

The lady glowed with satisfaction. He wished his sister Alice, now three years dead, were here to rout her. Alice, he knew, would prepare a speech for later and write many letters about the lady’s facial hair and her teeth and the crack which came in her voice when she reached the higher notes of admonition. The lady smiled at him.

‘I hope I have not alarmed you. You seem alarmed.’

He was indeed alarmed because he had found a small room with a writing table and paper and ink and some books, and he was busy writing a letter. It suddenly occurred to him that the best way of clearing this woman out of the room was by waving his two hands at her and making a noise as though she were a flock of hens or a gaggle of geese.

‘But it is lovely here,’ she continued, ‘and last year the balls were the most glittering events, much better than anything in London, you know.’

He stared at her grimly and, he hoped, blankly and said nothing.

‘And there are other people here,’ she began again, ‘who could learn a great deal from his lordship. You know in London we are invited regularly to several of the great houses. But we don’t know Lord Wolseley nor indeed do we know his wife. Lord Houghton was kind enough to introduce us at the intimate evening he held when we first arrived and I was placed beside him, and my husband, who is a very kind and sweet man and also very rich, if you don’t mind me saying so, and honest, of course, had the misfortune to be placed beside Lady Wolseley.’

She stopped to catch her breath and to move her indignant tone up one notch.

‘And Lord Wolseley must have learned a signalling system in one of his wars and he must have secretly instructed her to ignore my husband as he ignored me. The rudeness of him! And the rudeness of her! Lord Houghton was mortified. They are, I believe, the Wolseleys, a very, very rude pair.’

Henry took the view that it was time to terminate the conversation, but saw that she was sharply on the lookout for rudeness. Nonetheless, he felt that rudeness now would be a small matter compared with further minutes listening to her conversation.

‘I’m afraid that I have to return to my chambers urgently,’ he said.