Dinah turned swiftly round. A streak of sunset goldened her hair, and the delicate outlines of her face. She gave a look of farewell sincerity at Lord Rex Basire.
‘Do you remember,’ she asked him, ‘a conversation you and I had on board the steamer? It was just after my husband and the Thornes had landed at Alderney.’
Yes, Lord Rex remembered. He was not likely—this, with a sigh—to forget any hour or place in which he had had the good fortune to find himself alone with Mrs. Arbuthnot.
‘We spoke about class distinctions. I believe you called me a Conservative. Certainly you told me you were the most out-and-out demagogue in England. You were all for fraternity, Lord Rex. “Gardener Adam and his wife, and that sort of thing.” Labour was the universal purchase-money. Dukes and earls had best go back to the place from whence they came. Well—you meant none of this.’
Lord Rex winced. ‘Unfair on a fellow,’ he observed, ‘to be thus taken au pied de la lettre, and——’
‘You must speak in English,’ cried Dinah. ‘I have not French enough to understand your meaning.’
‘My dear Mrs. Arbuthnot! A man may hold theories,—visions of an impracticable Utopia, don’t you know ... charming—ahem! to air in exquisite company; impossible to carry out in this rough chaos of a world we live in.’
Dinah stopped for a minute or more, sedately reflecting, before she answered.
‘I think I understand. Socialistic opinions, if one is trying to make talk for a rather stupid woman at a picnic, may be well enough, especially if the rather stupid woman does not belong to one’s own station.’
‘Mrs. Arbuthnot! I protest——’