"How did you manage to shock the Squire so?" he asked.
"Oh, yes. Well, I suppose it was Mr. Bannister's poetry."
"Why should that shock him?" asked Sir Harry, who knew very well. "By Jove, I wish I could write some like it!"
"Of course _I_ do, but I didn't know whether you would. Do you know Miss Delane?"
"Oh, yes. I have known her all my life, and I like her. She frightens me a little, you know."
"She expects such a lot of a fellow. Have you met her?"
"No. D--Mr. Bannister has. He likes her."
"Oh, I shouldn't think so. Dale wouldn't like that."
"Depends how it's done," observed Sir Harry. "Don't you ever blow him up?"
"Of course not. I'm much too--I look up to him too much."
They were interrupted by the Colonel's voice. He was saying, with much energy:
"Ability we don't expect in a Government office, but honesty one might hope for."
"Just what Hodge used to say of old Pratt," said Mrs. Hodge.
"Pratt was his manager, you know--my husband's."
"Nellie, you remember your father throwing down that two pound ten on the table, and saying, 'Well, I'm----'"
"No, mother, I don't. Do you think I could learn to hunt, Sir Harry?"
"And Pratt said that if Hodge couldn't play the king at two pound ten a week,--though that's hard living, my dear,--I beg pardon--Colonel----"
The Colonel bowed courteously. Nellie grew very red.
"Why, bantam-cocks had risen since his day, and that was all about it." And Mrs. Hodge emptied her glass and beamed pleasantly on the company.
Suddenly Dale Bannister began to laugh gently. Tora Smith turned an inquiring look in his direction.
"I saw your father's butler looking at my friend Mrs. Hodge."
"What nonsense! Simmons is not allowed to look at anyone."
"I know what you mean," Tora continued; "but surely while they're actually waiting, Mr. Bannister, we can't treat them quite like ourselves? At any other time, of course----"
"They'd be horribly uncomfortable if I did," she answered, laughing.
"I have come to learn, not to criticise."
"We want a leader," said Tora, with pretty earnestness.
"Sir Harry Fulmer is our leader, but we're not contented with him. He's a very mild Radical. Won't you come to our help?"
"I expect I should be too extreme the other way."
"Oh, I love people who are extreme--in my direction, I mean."