“Yes; because the people who are running our show in Devon are very jealous, naturally, that we shall give a good account of ourselves. There’s a feeling in some quarters that nothing much in the way of fighting intellect comes from the West Country. Londoners and Northerners think it’s a sort of Turkish bath all the time down here—a place for holidays and Devonshire cream and playing about. So if I’m to be reported, as I shall be, that means a pretty good advertisement and a pretty high compliment. It’s come sooner than I expected, and I must rise to it, Medora.”
“You ain’t frightened to get up and talk to a crowd of men?”
“Not if I know I’m saying the right thing. I’d be frightened to do it if I wasn’t dead sure I was right, and that my ideas—our ideas—will rule the world before I’m an old man; but they will. I must prepare my speech with my heart and soul. Everything must give way to it.”
“Including me, I suppose?” she said.
“You’re in what they call another category, Medora. You are part of my own life—personal to me as I’m personal to you and, of course, our private affairs mean a lot to us.”
“I’m glad you think that.”
“But this belongs to the world of ideas—to our souls and our highest ambitions—what we’re born for, so to speak. I include you in it, Medora.”
“You needn’t then,” she said, “because though it may appear a small thing to you, my highest ambition at present is to know when I shall be a married woman.”
“Don’t talk in that tone of voice,” he said. “I feel all that, too, and you know I do, and I’m not going to sit down under it much longer; but that’s in another category, as I tell you. It won’t bring it any nearer talking. I’ll see, or write, to Mr. Dingle before much longer, if he doesn’t set to work; but in the meantime this affair will call for all my thought and attention out of business hours.”
“Perhaps it would be a convenience to you if I went and lived somewhere else?”