His hostess turned sharply, and walked back towards the front of the house where Sir Luke and Mr. Frome, a young and rising Under-Secretary, were waiting for her.  Meadows accompanied her, but found her exceedingly ungracious.  She did, however, inform him, as they followed the other two towards the exit from the garden, that she had come to the conclusion that the subject he was proposing for his second series of lectures, to be given at Dunstable House during the winter, “would never do.”

“Famous Controversies of the Nineteenth Century—­political and religious.”  The very sound of it was enough to keep people away!  “What people expect from you is talk about persons—­not ideas.  Ideas are not your line!”

Meadows flushed a little.  What his “line” might be, he said, he had not yet discovered.  But he liked his subject, and meant to stick to it.

Lady Dunstable turned on him a pair of sarcastic eyes.

“That’s so like you clever people.  You would die rather than take advice.”

“Advice!—­yes.  As much as you like, dear lady.  But—­”

“But what—­” she asked, imperatively, nettled in her turn.

“Well—­you must put it prettily!” said Meadows, smiling.  “We want a great deal of jam with the powder.”

“You want to be flattered?  I never flatter!  It is the most despicable of arts.”

“On the contrary—­one of the most skilled.  And I have heard you do it to perfection.”

His daring half irritated, half amused her.  It was her turn to flush.  Her thin, sallow face and dark eyes lit up vindictively.

“One should never remind one’s friends of their vices,” she said with animation.

“Ah—­if they are vices!  But flattery is merely a virtue out of place—­kindness gone wrong.  From the point of view of the moralist, that is.  From the point of view of the ordinary mortal, it is what no men—­and few women—­can do without!”

She smiled grimly, enjoying the spar.  They carried it on a little while, Meadows, now fairly on his mettle, administering a little deft though veiled castigation here and there, in requital for various acts of rudeness of which she had been guilty towards him and others during the preceding days.  She grew restive occasionally, but on the whole she bore it well.  Her arrogance was not of the small-minded sort; and the best chance with her was to defy her.

At the gate leading on to the moor, Meadows resolutely came to a stop.

“Your letters are the merest excuse!” said Lady Dunstable.  “I don’t believe you will write one of them!  I notice you always put off unpleasant duties.”

“Give me credit at least for the intention.”

Smiling, he held the gate open for her, and she passed through, discomfited, to join Sir Luke on the other side.  Mr. Frome, the Under-Secretary, a young man of Jewish family and amazing talents, who had been listening with amusement to the conversation behind him, turned back to say to Meadows, at a safe distance—­“Keep it up!—­Keep it up!  You avenge us all!”