‘And what’s that?’ asked Drake.

Clarice glanced round.  Her neighbours, she perceived, were talking.  Mrs. Willoughby was too far off to hear.  She dropped her voice to a yet lower key and said, ’They make the husband kill the lover in the duel.  It’s always the end in books and plays; but really the opposite of that would happen.’

Drake leant back in his chair and stared at her.  ‘What do you mean?’

‘Hush!’ she said warningly, and turning away she spoke for a little to the man on the other side of her.  Then she turned back.  ‘I mean,’ she said, ’if two people really care for one another, their love would triumph over everything—­everything.  De Valreas would have killed the husband.’  She spoke with an intense conviction of the truth of what she said.

‘But, my dear child!’ replied Drake.  ’You—­oh, you don’t really believe that.’

‘I do,’ she answered.  ’You see, there are so few people who really care for one another.  If you find two who do, I am sure they would conquer, whatever stood in the way.’

The conversation was interrupted, to Drake’s relief, by Captain Le Mesurier.  He rose from the corner of the table to propose the health of the guest of the evening.  He said that he was proud to be represented in Parliament by a man of Stephen Drake’s calibre.  If there was anything of which he was prouder, it was the way in which the election had been fought at Bentbridge.  That election was the triumph not merely of a man or a cause, but of a method; and that method was honesty and fair-play.  ‘We never indulged in personalities,’ he continued, with shameless sincerity.  ’I have always myself been very strong on that point.  Fight of course for all you’re worth, but never indulge in personalities.  It’s a good rule.  It’s a rule that helped Stephen Drake to win his seat.  We followed it.  We left the lies for the opponent to tell, and he told them.  But we never did and never will indulge in contemptible personalities.’

The Captain subsided to a gentle rapping of forks and spoons upon the table, while Fielding said pointedly, ’Yes, Captain, you deserve your holidays,’ and he emphasised the word.  The Captain caught the allusion and laughed heartily.  It was evident that he saw no inconsistency between the epigram and his professed method of contesting an election.

Drake replied shortly, and the ladies retired.  Mallinson moved round the table, and seated himself in the chair which Clarice had left.

‘Do you think of speaking at all during this session?’ he asked.

‘I am not quite sure,’ replied Drake; ’but I rather think I shall on the colonial vote.  You see there’s first-class wheat-growing land in Africa, quite near to the west coast.  We import practically all that we use in England.  Well, why shouldn’t we import it from our own dominions?  Besides, the route would be so much safer in times of war, unless, of course, we were at war with France.  Ships could slip up the coast of Africa, across the bay and into Plymouth with much less risk than if they have to sail from the Argentines or some place like that.  I believe, if the Colonial Office could be induced to move in the matter, the idea might be carried out.  What do you think?’