“We must certainly guard our young people against Mrs. Quarrier.  From the look of her, no one could have guessed what she would turn out.  The idea of so young a woman going to people’s houses and talking polities!”

“Oh, I think nothing of that!” remarked a lady who particularly wished to remind the company that she was still youthful.  “I canvass myself; it’s quite the proper thing for ladies to do.  But I’m told she has rather an impertinent way of speaking to every one who doesn’t fall down and worship her husband.”

“Mrs. Lester,” broke in the grave voice of the clergyman, “I trust you will pardon me, but you have inadvertently made use of a phrase which is, or should be, consecrated by a religious significance.”

The lady apologized rather curtly, and Mr. Vialls made a stiff bow.

At this same moment the subject of their conversation was returning home from a bold expedition into the camp of the enemy.  Encouraged by the personal friendliness that had been shown her in the family of Mr. Samuel Quarrier, Lilian conceived and nourished the hope that it was within her power to convert the sturdy old Tory himself.  Samuel made a joke of this, and entertained himself with a pretence of lending ear to her arguments.  This afternoon he had allowed her to talk to him for a long time.  Lilian’s sweetness was irresistible, and she came back in high spirits with report of progress.  Denzil, who had just been badgered by a deputation of voters who wished to discover his mind on seven points of strictly non-practical politics, listened with idle amusement.

“Dear girl,” he said presently, “the old fellow is fooling you t You can no more convert him than you could the Dalai-Lama to Christianity.”

“But he speaks quite seriously, Denzil!  He owns that he doesn’t like Beaconsfield, and”——­

“Don’t waste your time and your patience.  It’s folly, I assure you.  When you are gone he explodes with laughter.”

Lilian gazed at him for a moment with wide eyes, then burst into tears.

“Good heavens! what is the matter with you, Lily?” cried Denzil, jumping up.  “Come, come, this kind of thing won’t do!  You are overtaxing yourself.  You are getting morbidly excited.”

It was true enough, and Lilian was herself conscious of it, but she obeyed an impulse from which there seemed no way of escape.  Her conscience and her fears would not leave her at peace; every now and then she found herself starting at unusual sounds, trembling in mental agitation if any one approached her with an unwonted look, dreading the arrival of the post, the sight of a newspaper, faces in the street.  Then she hastened to the excitement of canvassing, as another might have turned to more vulgar stimulants.  Certainly her health had suffered.  She could not engage in quiet study, still less could rest her mind in solitary musing, as in the old days.

Denzil seated himself by her on the sofa.