'Affluence,' said Litvinoff.
'Ah, well,' said Roland, laughing—'it's very good as things go—but he has some reason for hating his betters.'
'Some reason besides the two pounds a week, do you mean?'
'Yes; his daughter, an awfully pretty, nice girl, made a fool of herself—but I'll tell you about that some other time. Shall we go this way? It is a little longer, but it leads round by Aspinshaw, and I want to call there to ask after Mrs Stanley; she has a cold. Old Stanley will be delighted to see you; he's always talking about you. I don't know how he stands your revolutionary ideas.'
Litvinoff laughed.
'I never air them to him. I never talk revolution unless there is some chance of making a convert; but some things are too impossible, and Mr Stanley as a revolutionist is not to be conceived.'
'Miss Stanley seems to be quite a convert, however, although she always had a leaning that way. But I don't think the conversion is a star in your crown. She lays the credit of it to some man—I forget his name—whom she heard in town. I suppose you know him?'
'Ah, yes; I remember Miss Stanley took me down splendidly one morning by saying that now she understood our views, thanks to this man Petrovitch. And I, who had been vainly flattering myself that I had made them intelligible to her!'
'By George, yes!' said Roland, secretly pleased. 'That was rather a facer. But then she didn't hear you at the Agora. Is this Petrovitch a gentleman?'
'Upon my word, I don't know. It seems he knows me, but somehow or other we never seem to meet. It is not impossible that I may have known him under some other name. I must ask Miss Stanley to describe him to me.'