Chum laughed a little, conscious that her wide eyes were alight with the absorption of the moment, and Mr. Halton laughed too. It was one of his chief attractions to her that he never paid her a compliment, or made a personal remark; and yet his quiet admiration was as patent to her as the noisy homage of duller men.
“I am extremely interested! Is that your theory as to the cause of the rioting?”
“The real cause, certainly. The oppression and low wage that was offered as an excuse is nothing to a logical mind dealing with these people. There are the innocent hemp-crops, and there are the wily yellow man and the fools of blacks. But as yet we have not the connecting link. They complained of corvée (forced labour), it is always the plea—but we complain of ganja with much more reason!”
“And do these people profess to cultivate hemp for export?”
“A Chinaman, dear lady, will profess anything—save the truth. It is all pidgeon to use his own universal expression. But if you will get up very early to-morrow—say be in the saddle by seven—I will take a day off and expound the ethics of China Town to you, with spectacular views as illustrations. Will you come?”
“With pleasure. But can’t you tell me—Ah! what a pity!”
The compliment contained in the genuine exclamation was perfect because impromptu. It was caused by the arrival on the scene of Captain Nugent, Mrs. Churton, and Ally, no longer talking of stamps but of tennis.
“Is it too wet to play, d’you think?” Diana Churton said to the Commissioner and Mrs. Lewin long before she reached them. “That’s the worst of grass—I wish we had gravel courts like that stuck-up Mrs. Bertie used to tell us they had in the Cape. D’you remember her, Brissy? My husband used to call her pea-hen!”
“Was she stuck-up? I thought she made herself rather friendly,”—Captain Nugent’s voice was equally strident to Mrs. Lewin’s ears. “She was telling some story about the State theatricals very first time I met her, and Jordan coming on the stage dead drunk! Rather good tale she made of it too.”
Chum began to see that she would have to like Brissy in spite of herself, if it were to be done at all. A sudden impatience of the chatter round her seized her with the tantalising glimpse of more exciting things to hear of from Halton. Five seconds later she changed her mental attitude, and condemned herself for her own lack of adaptability. It was one of her theories that the immediate thing was the one to grasp and develop as best might be, which mental schooling resulted in her becoming involved in a game of cat’s-cradle with Captain Nugent, who was playing with a piece of string which had been tied round the stamps album. Brissy had no conception of mental flirtations undermining even a discussion on hemp-growing round China Town; but he knew that if he got “fish-in-the-pond” his large hands would very likely touch Mrs. Lewin’s in the manipulation of the string. Ally had gone to find their ponies for the return home, and by the time he reappeared the Commissioner had also extricated himself after his quiet fashion and started with them.