"And you were disappointed when you met them?"
Ingleby made a little expressive gesture. "Chiefly in myself. I thought I was strong enough not to mind being treated as a professional and politely ignored except when I was useful. Then I imagined it would be excellent discipline, and discipline is presumably good for one, as the worthy vicar, who really appears to have ideas, is fond of observing."
Again the girl glanced at him sharply, with a faint but perceptible arching of her brows.
"Isn't that a trifle patronizing?" she said. "You can't be very much older than I am, and he has, at least, seen a good deal of the world."
Ingleby laughed frankly, though there was a little flush in his face. "I know I very often talk like a fool—and the difference between you and the others is that you very seldom think it necessary to remind me of it. That is, of course, one difference. The rest——"
"I think," said the girl, severely, "we were talking about the vicar."
"Well," said Ingleby, "I really believe he means well, but he is, after all, part of the system, and naturally interested in maintaining the existing state of things. We have in England a few great bolstered-up professions, one could almost call them professional rings, and the men fortunate enough to enter them are more or less compelled to play into one another's hands. The millions who don't belong to them are, of course, outsiders, and couldn't be expected to count, you see."
The girl stiffened perceptibly, and really looked very patrician as she turned and regarded him indignantly.
"You appear to forget that my father belongs to one of those professions," she said.
"He did," corrected Ingleby, and then stopped abruptly, as he remembered it was reputed that it was not exactly by his own wish Major Coulthurst no longer actively served his nation.