'Oh, yes,' said Borrodaile. 'Oh, yes.'
'And the way'—Farnborough made up for any lack of enthusiasm—'the way he handled that Balkan question!'
'All that was pure routine,' Lord John waved it aside. 'But if Stonor had ever looked upon politics as more than a game, he'd have been a power long before this.'
'Ah,' said Borrodaile, slowly, 'you go as far as that? I doubt myself if he has enough of the demagogue in him.'
'But that's just why. The English people are not like the Americans or the French. The English have a natural distrust of the demagogue. I tell you if Stonor once believed in anything with might and main, he'd be a leader of men.'
'Here he is now.'
Farnborough was the first to distinguish the sound of carriage wheels behind the shrubberies. The others looked up and listened. Yes, the crunch of gravel. The wall of laurel was too thick to give any glimpse from this side of the drive that wound round to the main entrance. But some animating vision nevertheless seemed miraculously to have penetrated the dense green wall, to the obvious enlivenment of the company.
'It's rather exciting seeing him at close quarters,' Hermione said to Filey.
'Yes! He's the only politician I can get up any real enthusiasm for. He's so many-sided. I saw him yesterday at a Bond Street show looking at caricatures of himself and all his dearest friends.'
'Really. How did he take the sacrilege?'