"By the way, has she any?" Collingwood asked.
"Well, if she hasn't, how does she do it?"
"By her wits, my dear."
"Ellerdine doesn't go in for wits," Peggy remarked.
"Poor, dear Dicky! he is the diplomatic failure of the century."
"I suppose he is, but it is an ill wind that blows nobody good. The Empire's loss is Attwill's gain."
Collingwood laughed. "Well," he said, "she's the only post he has been able to keep."
"I don't know that he can afford to keep anything. Can he be in love with her, do you think?"
Collingwood puffed slowly at his cigarette.
"My dear Peggy," he said, looking her up and down with a curious meditative gaze—"my dear Peggy, if a man loves a woman he doesn't leave a comfortable hotel to travel all night in a slow train with her. Ellerdine is as likely to spend his money on a home for lost cats as on the Attwill."