y.

"I suppose so," answered Sir John doubtfully; "only it always sounds a
little mean, you know."

Eleanor did not attempt to reconcile this seeming contradiction.

"So Sir Robert will be back? Well, Mary will be delighted."

"It doesn't so much matter to her, as you're going."

"No, but she will. For my own part, I like Sir Robert, but his
Government rather lacks variety, doesn't it? It's not exactly
thrilling."

"That's very high praise."

"I hardly meant it to be," laughed Eleanor. "However, as you say, it
doesn't matter much now to us."

"No, nor to me."

"Then it's true you're resigning?"

"Yes, in a few weeks. I'm just holding on to----"

"See this crisis through, I suppose?"

"Oh dear, no. The crisis, as you call it, Miss Scaife, don't matter to
me--nor I to it. I'm holding on to complete another year's service and
get fifty pound more pension."

"You're very practical, Sir John."

"High praise again!"

"Perhaps hardly meant again!"

"I'm sure Lady Eynesford teaches her household the value of
practicality."

"Well, Mary is practical; and I suppose Dick must be called so now--Miss
Granger's an excellent match. Oh, I suppose we all pass muster pretty
well, except Alicia."

"Miss Derosne is a visionary?"

"A little bit of one, I often tell her."

"It's an added grace in a pretty girl," said Sir John.

"I said _I_ was practical," observed Miss Scaife.

"But you need no added graces," he returned, smiling.

"A palpable evasion!"

Some days had passed since Medland's interview with Alicia. He had left
Kirton the morning after, and, as the day of the election drew nearer
and nearer, news of him came from all parts of the colony. Wherever the
opposition was strongest and hostility most bitter, he flung himself
into the fray; at moments it seemed as though he would wrest victory
from an adverse fate, but when he went away, the effect of his presence
gradually evaporated, and his work was half undone before he had been
gone a day. In the Governor's household the accounts of his doings were
allowed to pass in silence; they had become a forbidden topic. Alicia
might devour them in solitude, and the Governor himself watch them with
an almost sympathetic interest; Lady Eynesford ignored them altogether,
and seemed not to see Medland's colours and his watchwords that glared
at her in the streets of Kirton. Sir Robert was quietly confident, and
Kilshaw fiercely exultant; Medland's friends hoped