"He's a fine figure of a man, anyhow," said the Cabinet Minister.

"The most striking-looking man in the room!" was the lady's answer.

And then her attention and smiles were given to the next comers.

Paul was not long left alone, and quickly found himself quite a centre of interest. More than one Member of Parliament brought his lady friends to see the new star. Indeed, he was so much monopolised that for a time he had little opportunity to take notice of the guests as a whole. By and by, however, he managed to get away by himself, and to take the part of a spectator.

It was all very strange to him, this gay throng--and he was not very favourably impressed. If this was Society, he did not want it!

Everyone seemed blase and satiated with pleasure. The conversation was clever, but superficial. It seemed to him as though almost everyone lacked earnestness--lacked reality.

"I am glad you are interesting!" said one lady to him during the evening. Paul had been with her some time, and had given expression to some very unconventional opinions. "The greatest sin I know of is to be dull, and you can't be dull."

"No?" said Paul. "I think I'm a fairly good actor."

"No, you have a good deal of the devil in you, and I like a man of your sort. Do you know I saw a criticism of a book the other day of which you remind me?"

"And of course you've read the book?"

"Oh no! The critique said that the only bad book was the book which was badly written, no matter what its morals might be, and this book, although excellently intentioned, was not well written. You know I have a similar feeling about men. The greatest crime in the calendar is to be dull. Men may break all the other commandments if they like, but he who breaks that is impossible. And I find you so interesting!"

"And I feel myself so dull," said Paul. "I don't follow your simile a bit."

"Ah, but you're not conventional. The great charm of a man is that he's always going off the beaten tracks. When he gets back to those he is impossible! Do you know, I hoped you would come in your working-clothes. Our hostess told me you were coming, and I quite looked forward to seeing you."

"My working-clothes are very shabby," said Paul. "Still, if I had thought you wanted to see them, I would have brought them."

The lady laughed good-humouredly. "Oh, but do remain unconventional!"

she said. "Don't become a polished Society man. If you are to be interesting, always keep off the beaten tracks."

"Even at the expense of politeness?" said Paul.

The lady looked at him quizzically. "Yes, even at the expense of politeness."

"Then I'll run away. There's someone over here I want to speak to," he said.

The truth was, at that moment he had caught sight of a face which had set his heart beating wildly, for he felt sure it was that of Mary Bolitho. "Oh, I wonder, after all, whether it can be!" he said to himself.

Regardless of pa.s.sing faces, he found his way toward the spot where he thought he had seen her, and to his delight he discovered that he had not made a mistake. Their eyes met as he came up, and she held out her hand with a smile.

"This is splendid!" he said. "It's so pleasant to see a face that one knows amid a crowd of strangers!"

"But surely you must know hosts of people here," was her response.

"No, I know very few," replied Paul. "Some of the men I have met in the Members' Lobby, but nearly everyone is a stranger to me."

"And yet I find that many people are talking about you!" was her reply.

"You are quite the lion of the evening. It must be very gratifying to you."

"Do you know," replied Paul, "that I am not so unsophisticated as not to know the value of these things?"

She looked at him inquiringly.

"I can see how much a moment's popularity is worth," he said, almost bitterly. "A lifetime of good work is pa.s.sed by unnoticed, but if one happens to make a speech that causes a certain amount of discussion, no matter how silly it may be, one gets noticed until someone else appears. And my speech was a very poor one! I feel ashamed every time I am complimented on it!"

There was something in the way he spoke that annoyed her, why she could not tell. "Then I will not add to your shame," she said.

"No," he replied eagerly. "But I do want you to think well of it even although I know it was a failure. I have been wondering lately if I should meet you, and I was afraid once or twice lest I had seen you."

"I do not quite understand."

"I am comparatively new to this sort of function," said Paul. "And, to tell you the truth, I have been very weary of it all."

"How disappointed your hostess would be if she knew!"

"No," said Paul, "I don't deserve that. But I suppose it's because I have not been brought up in this world. I am a plain, humble fellow, and have had to work my way through the grimy and sordid things of life. Still, there's something real in it, something healthy, too, compared with this--at least, some of it. The other night I was at a banquet, and I was afraid I saw you. You see, I have all sorts of old-fashioned ideas. I'm a Puritan of a sort, and am what these people would call bourgeois."

"What in the world do you mean?"

"I saw a girl who looked like you smoking a cigarette. She had the same coloured hair, and bore such a strong resemblance to you that my heart became as heavy as lead. A little later I saw the same girl, or someone very much like her, drinking a liqueur. Of course, it seemed quite the order of the day, and I ought not to be shocked, but had it been you I should have been very sad."

"Why, what is there so terrible in a cigarette or a liqueur?" asked Mary Bolitho.

"I don't know, I'm sure," he replied.

"You'd have taken no notice if a man smoked a cigarette or drank a liqueur. Is a woman different from a man?"

"She ought to be," said Paul. "At least, so it seems to me; but then, as I tell you, I am altogether out of place among that kind of people.

I have all sorts of old-fashioned ideas about women. I know they are unpopular. They are thought to be bourgeois, and entertained only by the middle cla.s.ses. But there you are--I am bourgeois; or perhaps I belong to a lower cla.s.s even than that. I'm a working man."

"Can you find a chair for me somewhere?" asked the girl. "Of course I don't agree with you in the least, but it's rather interesting to hear you."

He found a chair for her and stood by her side. "I'm so glad it wasn't you."

"How do you know it wasn't I?" she asked.

"Because you're not that sort! You don't drink liqueurs. You don't smoke cigarettes!"

"Why not?"

"I don't know," replied Paul; "but you don't. If you did--well, it would be wrong somehow. I can't explain it, but it feels to me something like--well, what I think a Roman Catholic would feel if he found someone trying to caricature the Virgin Mary." His voice was so earnest and sincere that she could not be offended.

"I am not like all these men here," went on Paul. "I was brought up among the working-cla.s.ses, and I have, in spite of everything, idealised women. I expect it is because I love my mother. And when I see a girl drinking liqueurs, smoking cigarettes, and doing things like that, I feel that somehow my ideal is, well, besmirched somehow. I believe less in the modesty of women, and I think it's a bad thing for any man to lower his ideals concerning women! Yes, I am so glad it wasn't you!"

"Still I don't understand why."

"Because you are the most sacred thing in my life!" he answered. "I have tried to tell you that before now, only somehow I haven't been able. You are the most wonderful thing in the world to me, and you hate these things too, don't you?"

"Why should you think so? There are many better girls than I who smoke and drink liqueurs."

"No," said Paul. "No. Do you know that, although I have hated you, you've been the one dream of my life, and that you've made everything possible to me? You're angry with me, aren't you?"