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By Root 5905 0

ourselves with the divine right of kings. Cromwell smashed the divine right of kings, but imposed the tyranny of the landowners and the middle classes. The tyranny of the landowners and the middle classes is rapidly being destroyed, in order that we may have the dictatorship of the proletariat. A new infallibility, not of the Pope, but of the majority, has been propounded—an infallibility which we are compelled by law to believe in. The British Freemen are pledged to a new reformation and a new political revolution. We shall dispose of the dictatorship of the proletariat as our fathers disposed of the divine right of kings. We shall deny majority infallibility as they denied papal infallibility. The British Freemen stand for…’ Elinor had some difficulty in turning the page. Stand for what? she wondered. For the dictatorship of Everard and the infallibility of Webley? She blew at the recalcitrant pages; they fluttered apart. ‘…for justice and liberty. Their policy is that the best men shall rule, whatever their origin. Careers, in a word, must be fully open to talents. That is justice. They demand that every problem shall be dealt with on its own merits, intelligently, without reference to traditional party prejudices or the worthless opinion of stupid majorities. That is liberty. Those who imagine that liberty is synonymous with universal suffrage…’ A door banged; a loud voice resounded in the hall. There was a rush of feet on the stairs; the house shook. The door of the drawing-room burst open, as though a bomb had exploded on the outside. Everard Webley came in on a burst of loud apology and welcome.

‘How can I excuse myself?’ he cried, as he took her hands. ‘But if you knew what a whirl I live in! How marvellous it is to see you again! Not changed at all. As lovely as ever.’ He looked intently into her face. The same serene pale eyes, the same full and melancholy lips. ‘And looking so wonderfully well!’

She smiled back at him. His eyes were a very dark brown; from a little distance they seemed all pupil. Fine eyes, but rather disquieting, she found, in their intent, bright, watchful fixity. She looked into them a moment, then turned away. ‘You too,’ she said, ‘just the same. But then I don’t know why we should be different.’ She glanced back into his face and found him still intently looking at her. ‘Ten months and travelling in the tropics don’t turn one into somebody else.’

Everard laughed. ‘Thank heaven for that!’ he said. ‘Let’s come down to lunch.’

‘And Philip?’ he asked, when the fish had been served

‘Is he also the same as ever?’

‘A little more so, if possible.’

Everard nodded. ‘A little more so. Quite. One would expect it. Seeing blackamoors walking about without trousers must have made him still more sceptical about the eternal verities than he was.’

Elinor smiled, but at the same time was a little offended by his mockery. ‘And what’s been the effect on you of seeing so many Englishmen walking about in pea-green uniforms?’ she retorted.

Everard laughed.’strengthened my belief in the eternal verities, of course.’

‘Of which you’re one?’

He nodded. ‘Of which, naturally, I’m one.’ They looked at one another, smiling. It was Elinor again who first averted her eyes.

‘Thanks for telling me.’ She kept up the note of irony. ‘I mightn’t have guessed by myself.’ There was a little silence.

‘Don’t imagine,’ he said at last in a tone that was no more bantering, but serious, ‘that you can make me lose my temper by telling me that I’ve got a swelled head.’ He spoke softly; but you were conscious of huge reserves of power. ‘Other people might succeed perhaps. But then one doesn’t like to be bothered by the lower animals. One squashes them. But with fellow humans one discusses things rationally.’

‘I’m most relieved to hear it,’ laughed Elinor.

‘You think I’ve got a swelled head,’ he went on. ‘And I suppose it’s true in a way. But the trouble is, I know it’s justified—experimentally. Modesty’s harmful if it’s false. Milton said that “nothing profits more than self-esteem founded on just and right.” I know that mine