hey ever would. Nothing, however, made him more miserable than
indecision. And so, now that he was on the point of deciding, and the
decision promised vigorous consequences, he felt almost elated. Closing
his jaws once more too firmly, this time on lamb, he bit his tongue
again. It was impossible to confess what he had done, for two of his
children were there, expected to eat with that well-bred detachment which
precludes such happenings; and he rose from dinner with his mind made up.
Instead of going back to the House of Commons, he went straight to a
strike-breaking agency. No grass should grow under the feet of his
decision! Thence he sought the one post-office still open, despatched a
long telegram to his agent, another to the chief constable of
Worcestershire; and, feeling he had done all he could for the moment,
returned to the 'House,' where they were debating the rural housing
question. He sat there, paying only moderate attention to a subject on
which he was acknowledged an authority. To-morrow, in all probability,
the papers would have got hold of the affair! How he loathed people
poking their noses into his concerns! And suddenly he was assailed, very
deep down, by a feeling with which in his firmness he had not reckoned--a
sort of remorse that he was going to let a lot of loafing blackguards
down onto his land, to toss about his grass, and swill their beastly beer
above it. And all the real love he had for his fields and coverts, all
the fastidiousness of an English gentleman, and, to do him justice, the
qualms of a conscience telling him that he owed better things than this
to those born on his estate, assaulted him in force. He sat back in his
seat, driving his long legs hard against the pew in front. His thick,
wavy, still brown hair was beautifully parted above the square brow that
frowned over deep-set eyes and a perfectly straight nose. Now and again
he bit into a side of his straw-colored moustache, or raised a hand and
twisted the other side. Without doubt one of the handsomest and perhaps
the most Norman-looking man in the whole 'House.' There was a feeling
among those round him that he was thinking deeply. And so he was. But
he had decided, and he was not a man who went back on his decisions.

Morning brought even worse sensations. Those ruffians that he had
ordered down--the farmers would never consent to put them up! They would
have to camp. Camp on his land! It was then that fo