And the impulse to experiment in life grew so strong with him, that he had to go apart under the trees, and pace nervously about; idle talk being no longer endurable.

The gathering began to thin.  He had noted the train by which he would return to London, and a glance at his watch told him that he must start if he would reach the station in time.  Moving towards the group of people about the hostess, he encountered Mrs. Toplady.

“Have you a cab?” she asked.  “If not, there’s plenty of room in ours.”

Dymchurch would have liked to refuse, but hesitation undid him.  Face to face with Mrs. Toplady and May, he drove to the station, and, as was inevitable, performed the rest of the journey in their company.  The afternoon had tired him; alone, he would have closed his eyes, and tried to shut out the kaleidoscopic sensation which resulted from theatrical costumes, brilliant illustrations of the feminine mode, blue sky and sunny glades; but May Tomalin was as fresh as if new-risen, and still talked, talked.  Enthusiastic in admiration of Lady Honeybourne, she heard with much interest that Dymchurch’s acquaintance with the Viscount went back to Harrow days.

“That’s what I envy you,” she exclaimed, “your public school and University education!  They make us feel our inferiority, and it isn’t fair.”

Admission of inferiority was so unexpected a thing on Miss Tomalin’s lips, that her interlocutor glanced at her.  Mrs. Toplady, in her corner of the railway carriage, seemed to be smiling over a newspaper article.

“The feeling must be very transitory,” said Dymchurch, with humorous arch of brows.

“Oh, it doesn’t trouble me very often.  I know I should have done just as much as men do, if I had had the chance.”

“Considerably more, no doubt, than either Honeybourne or I.”

“You have never really put out your strength, I’m afraid, Lord Dymchurch,” said May, regarding him with her candid smile.  “Never in anything—­have you?”

“No,” he responded, in a like tone.  “A trifler—­always a trifler!”

“But if you know it—­”

Something in his look made her pause.  She looked out of the window, before adding: 

" Still, I don’t think it’s quite true.  The first time I saw you, I felt you were very serious, and that you had thought much.  You rather overawed me.”

Dymchurch laughed.  In her corner, Mrs. Toplady still found matter for ironic smiling as she rustled over the evening journal; and the train swept on towards London.

CHAPTER XVI