"And how do you propose it should be administered—indiscriminately, and no questions asked? That would be rather hard on the taxpayers, and bad for the people themselves. I think even the Charitable Relief Fund Committee would hardly work on those lines."
She ignored his argument. "It's appalling," she went on heatedly, "to find how badly private charity is needed. I came out a few weeks ago to see what I could do to help, and I'm horrified. Where would all these unfortunate people be without the Charitable Relief Fund!"
"If it comes to that," he retorted, "where would they be without all the Government machinery that is kept ready to be set going directly scarcity becomes serious—the means of transport, the linking up with unaffected Provinces, the loans for seed and cattle. Good Heavens, you can have no conception of the work."
She opened her mouth to speak, but he stopped her with a peremptory gesture, and continued quickly: "Private charity is of the utmost value in a calamity of this kind, and we are only too thankful for it, especially in remote regions, but personal sacrifice and hard work isn't entirely confined to the non-official. The help would be simply a drop in the ocean if the way hadn't been prepared. Try to be just, Miss——"
He waited interrogatively.
"Baker—Dorothy Baker"—she waved her cigarette. "You may have heard of my father, Lord Redgate?"
So here was the solution of the girl's extraordinary antagonism. She was the daughter of a new-made nobleman whose apparent object in life, to judge by his speeches, was to disparage British administration in India, to discount the long years of effort and experience, to undermine confidence in honest rule. No doubt such an undertaking engendered a nice sense of superiority and importance that blinded its owner to the truth, if his eyes were not shut deliberately. This obtrusive young woman was clearly imbued with her parent's particular form of conceit. He would not trouble to wrangle with her further.
"Oh! yes," he said indifferently; "we have all heard of your father. Did he object to your coming out here alone?"
"Object? Of course not. He believes in the freedom of the individual. And if he had objected I should be here all the same. I always do as I please."
"And it pleased you to come out and do famine work. How kind of you!"