When Mary turned to Fabian Rose he was standing side by side with the Reverend Peter Conrad.
Both men were looking at her gravely and a little curiously.
"Who is this Colonel Simpson?" she asked. "Could not he be exposed in the Press? Could not he be held up to execration? Could not you, Mr. Goodrick," she said, flashing upon the editor, who had hitherto remained in the background and said no word, "could not you tell the world of the wickedness of this Colonel Simpson?"
The little man with the straw-coloured moustache and the keen eyes smiled.
"Miss Marriott," he said, "you realise very little as yet. You do not know what the forces of capitalism and monopoly mean. Day by day we are driving our chisels into the basis of the structure, and some day it will begin to totter; some day, again, it will fall, but not yet, not yet. Mr. Simpson is a mere nobody. He is a machine. His object in life is to get as much money as he can out of the vast properties which he controls for another. He is an agent, nothing more."
"Then who does this really belong to? Who is really responsible?" Mary asked.
Fabian Rose looked at her very meaningly.
"Once more," he said, "I will pronounce that ill-omened name—the Duke of Paddington."
"Let us go away," Mr. Conrad said suddenly. He noticed that Mary's face was very pale, and that she was swaying a little.
They went out into the hall and stood there for a moment undecided as to what to do.