‘Thank you,—­I am not thinking of being off.’

‘I’m going to the House of Commons,—­won’t you come?’

‘What are you going there for?’

Directly she spoke of it I knew why she was going,—­and she knew that I knew, as her words showed.

’You are quite well aware of what the magnet is.  You are not so ignorant as not to know that the Agricultural Amendment Act is on to-night, and that Paul is to speak.  I always try to be there when Paul is to speak, and I mean to always keep on trying.’

‘He is a fortunate man.’

’Indeed,—­and again indeed.  A man with such gifts as his is inadequately described as fortunate.—­But I must be off.  He expected to be up before, but I heard from him a few minutes ago that there has been a delay, but that he will be up within half-an-hour.—­Till our next meeting.’

As I returned into the house, in the hall I met Percy Woodville.  He had his hat on.

‘Where are you off to?’

‘I’m off to the House.’

‘To hear Paul Lessingham?’

‘Damn Paul Lessingham!’

‘With all my heart!’

‘There’s a division expected,—­I’ve got to go.’

‘Someone else has gone to hear Paul Lessingham,—­Marjorie Lindon.’

’No!—­you don’t say so!—­by Jove!—­I say, Atherton, I wish I could make a speech,—­I never can.  When I’m electioneering I have to have my speeches written for me, and then I have to read ’em.  But, by Jove, if I knew Miss Lindon was in the gallery, and if I knew anything about the thing, or could get someone to tell me something, hang me if I wouldn’t speak,—­I’d show her I’m not the fool she thinks I am!’

’Speak, Percy, speak!—­you’d knock ’em silly, sir!—­I tell you what I’ll do,—­I’ll come with you!  I’ll to the House as well!—­ Paul Lessingham shall have an audience of three.’

CHAPTER XV

MR LESSINGHAM SPEAKS

The House was full.  Percy and I went upstairs,—­to the gallery which is theoretically supposed to be reserved for what are called ’distinguished strangers,’—­those curious animals.  Trumperton was up, hammering out those sentences which smell, not so much of the lamp as of the dunderhead.  Nobody was listening,—­except the men in the Press Gallery; where is the brain of the House, and ninety per cent, of its wisdom.

It was not till Trumperton had finished that I discovered Lessingham.  The tedious ancient resumed his seat amidst a murmur of sounds which, I have no doubt, some of the press-men interpreted next day as ‘loud and continued applause.’  There was movement in the House, possibly expressive of relief; a hum of voices; men came flocking in.  Then, from the Opposition benches, there rose a sound which was applause,-and I perceived that, on a cross bench close to the gangway, Paul Lessingham was standing up bareheaded.

I eyed him critically,—­as a collector might eye a valuable specimen, or a pathologist a curious subject.  During the last four and twenty hours my interest in him had grown apace.  Just then, to me, he was the most interesting man the world contained.