Empire-building language fell from Oswald. In some obscure way this feminine intervention was swept aside, and talk was resumed with Mr. Sycamore.
It continued to be a fragmentary talk, and for a time the burthen of some unknown lady complaining to an unknown friend about the behaviour of a third unknown named George, stated to lack “gumption,” interwove with the main theme. But Mr. Sycamore did succeed in conveying to Oswald a sense of urgency about the welfare of his two charges. Immediate attention was demanded. They were being neglected. The girl was ill. “I would like to talk it over with you as soon as possible,” said Mr. Sycamore.
“Can you come and breakfast here at eight?” said the man from the tropics.
“Half past nine,” said the Londoner, and the talk closed.
The talk ended, but for a time the bell of Oswald’s telephone remained in an agitated state, giving little nervous rings at intervals. When he answered these the exchange said “Number please,” and when he said, “You rang me,” the exchange said, “Oh, no! we didn’t....”
“An empire,” whispered Oswald, sitting on the edge of his bed, “which cannot even run a telephone service efficiently....”
“Education....”
He tried to recall his last speech at the club. Had he ranted? What had they thought of it? What precisely had he said? While they sat and talked muck—his memory was unpleasantly insistent upon that “muck”—the sands ran out of the hour-glass, a new generation grew up.
Had he said that? That was the point of it all—about the new generation. A new generation was growing up and we were doing nothing to make it wiser, more efficient, to give it a broader outlook than the generation that had blundered into and blundered through the Boer war. Had he said that? That was what he ought to have said.