"Yes! Amusing, isn't it? But you, I think, don't trouble much about such questions."
"It seems to me waste of time."
She was thinking of Dyce Lashmar, asking herself whether she would meet him, or not, to-morrow morning. Certainly she wished to do so. Lashmar at a distance left her coolly reasonable; she wanted to recover the emotional state of mind which had come about during their stolen interview. With Lord Dymchurch, though his attentions were flattering, she could not for a moment imagine herself touched by romantic feeling.
"So it is," he was saying. "To waste time in that way has always been one of my bad habits. But I am going to get rid of it."
He seemed on the point of adding more significant words. May heard the sound fail in his throat; saw without looking at him—his sudden embarrassment. When the words came, as surely they would, what was to be her answer? She hoped for inspiration. Why should it be necessary for her to make precise reply? No! She would not. Freedom and the exercise of power were what she wanted. Enough to promise her answer a month, or half a year, hence. If the old lady didn't like it, let her learn patience.
Dymchurch sat bending forward. The dry leaf crackled between his fingers; he was crushing it to powder.
"Who," he asked, "is the lady Miss Bride was speaking of, in connection with the servant's training-school?"
"Mrs. Gallantry. A good, active sort of woman at Hollingford."
"That scheme doesn't interest you much?"
"Not very much, I confess. I quite approve of it. It's just the kind of thing for people like Miss Bride, plodding and practical; no doubt they'll make it very useful. But I have rather lost my keenness for work of that sort. Perhaps I have grown out of it. Of course I wish as much as ever for the good of the lower classes, but I feel that my own work will lie in another direction."