“They will come,” she said, “and the people will wait. Tell me some more of your wonderful London.”
“You have never been there?” he exclaimed in astonishment.
She shook her head.
“No, nor in Paris even. No further west than Vienna.”
“It is incredible,” he murmured.
“And why incredible?” she asked him, with delicately upraised eyebrows. “I do not understand. Theos is my home—those places are nothing to me. Whilst I was in Vienna I was miserable. All was hurry and bustle. There was so little dignity, so little repose. I do not think that people who live in such places can understand what it is to love one’s homeland. Everywhere, too, even amongst the aristocracy, one met vulgar people. Shopkeepers and merchants who had made very much money mixed freely with the nobles. They tell me that in England it is also like this. In Theos I think that we are wiser.”
She spoke simply—as one who points out a grievous impropriety. Brand smiled.
“I have heard your country spoken of as one of the most aristocratic in the world,” he remarked. “I think that it must be true.”
“From what I have seen,” she answered, “it may be so. There are very little of the old nobility left in Theos, but we are content to let them die out rather than to raise to their ranks those who have enriched themselves with commerce. We believe that our way is best.”