“You have told me very little about yourself,” he remarked, when she rose to withdraw after luncheon.

“What’s there to tell?”

“It would interest me to know more of your own thoughts—­apart from the work you are engaged in.”

“Oh, those are strictly for home consumption,” said Constance with a smile; and went her way.

So Dyce paced the garden by himself, or read newspapers and reviews, or lolled indolently in super-comfortable chairs.  He had promised to write to Mrs. Woolstan, and in the morning said to himself that he would do so in the afternoon; but he disliked letter-writing, shrank at all times, indeed, from use of the pen, and ultimately the duty was postponed till to-morrow.  His exertions of the evening before had left a sense of fatigue; it was enough to savour the recollection of triumph.  He mused a little, from time to time, on Constance, whose behaviour slightly piqued his curiosity.  That she was much occupied with the thought of him, he never doubted, but he could not feel quite sure of the colour of her reflections—­a vexatious incertitude.  He lazily resolved to bring her to clearer avowal before quitting Rivenoak.

At evening, the coachman drove him to Hollingford, where he alighted at Mr. Breakspeare’s newspaper office.  The editor received him in a large, ill-kept, barely furnished room, the floor littered with journals.

“How will that do, Mr. Lashmar?” was his greeting, as he held out a printed slip.

Dyce perused a leading article, which, without naming him, contained a very flattering sketch of his intellectual personality.  So, at least, he understood the article, ostensibly a summing of the qualifications which should be possessed by an ideal Liberal candidate.  Large culture, a philosophical grasp of the world’s history, a scientific conception of human life; again, thorough familiarity with the questions of the day, a mind no less acute in the judgment of detail than broad in its vision of principles:  moreover, genuine sympathy with the aspirations of the average man, yet no bias to sentimental weakness; with all this, the heaven-sent gift of leadership, power of speech, calm and justified self-confidence.  Lashmar’s face beamed as he recognised each trait.  Breakspeare, the while, regarded him with half-closed eyes in which twinkled a world of humour.

“A little too generous, I’m afraid,” Dyce remarked at length, thoughtfully.

“Not a bit of it!” cried the editor, scratching the tip of his nose, where he had somehow caught a spot of ink.  “Bald facts; honest portraiture.  It doesn’t displease you?”

“How could it?  I only hope I may be recognised by such of your readers as have met me.”

“You certainly will be.  I shall follow this up with a portrait of the least acceptable type of Conservative candidate, wherein all will recognise our Parliamentary incubus.  Thus do we open the great campaign!  If you would care to, pray keep that proof; some day it may amuse you to look at it, and to recall these early days of our acquaintance.  Now I will take you to my house, which, I need not say, you honour by this visit.  You are a philosopher, and simplicity will not offend you.”