"Mr. Cardington," she said gaily, "don't stand there like a clock-tower, without striking a note, but take Mr. Littleford's place here by me."
He did as she commanded, and having given his order, he took out a cigarette and puffed meditatively.
"Now please don't fall into the doleful doldrums," she protested, "when we 've had such an enlivening evening."
"A most effective alliteration," he murmured, but without spontaneity. It was evident that the doldrums were very real with him, for he made no effort to take part in the ensuing conversation, in spite of the fact that the subject was one which might have aroused him to his best endeavours.
Felicity's mood was a revelation to Leigh, though he could not fail to divine its cause, and to guess the emotions she had undergone. Had her pride led her to defend her husband, or had she been reserved and sad, he would not have been surprised, but her sparkle and gaiety were like the glancing of light on the surface of a rock. She even shared in Mrs. Parr's ecstatic triumph over Emmet and echoed her praise of Cobbens, but with a subtle effect of mockery, so that her friend was presently reduced to a hurt and bewildered silence. In all this Leigh saw the effect of her husband's humiliation upon her, that it had torn from the mayor the last shred of the glamour with which her foolish fancy had once surrounded him. He was moved to speculate upon her probable attitude, had Emmet seized his opportunity and risen adequately to the occasion, but the speculation was fruitless, and the present topic of conversation full of hazard to himself. He was guiltless of the vulgarity of showing an animus against Emmet, guiltless also of the hypocrisy of defending him against his wife; and he embraced the opportunity Mrs. Parr's discomfiture offered of turning the talk to Bermuda.
How much of this psychological drama was visible to Cardington it would be impossible to say, but apparently he was lost to his surroundings, for he allowed the others to thresh out the Emmet incident without the assistance of his own able flail. Not until the conversation turned to Bermuda did he arouse himself from his reverie and take the lead. The topic suggested to his mind the influence of climate upon architecture and the arts, and presently he was exploring distant ramifications of the theme.
"I feel it incumbent upon myself," Cardington said, "to confess that I gave Mr. Emmet my careful consideration this evening, during the moments I could spare from a contemplation of our Chief Executive, and I must say that I found him the more interesting study of the two. I began to demolish my earlier views, or prejudices, and to build up a new opinion of the man. Fairness compels me to admit that I got a different conception of his possibilities. As I sat looking at him, expecting to see every sign of demoralisation in his aspect, I began to perceive that he by no means regarded himself down and out for good, if you will allow the sporting phrase. Mr. Emmet was fooled this time, but he will not be fooled again. I thought I could see that he had learned his lesson well, and if I were Mr. Anthony Cobbens, I should feel the stirring of a very considerable doubt as to the ultimate outcome of the struggle to which he has now committed himself. Perhaps he has provoked a jinnee in that young man which will one day rise up and envelop him in a cloud of political suffocation. Don't you think so, Miss Felicity?"
He looked at her inquiringly, anticipating her acquiescence. In his expression the ideal and impersonal quality that constituted his peculiar charm was now apparent, and suggested an inward exaltation, as if he had gained a victory over himself and had made an honourable amend. Leigh, watching her with tense emotion, saw that she was deeply impressed, and he seemed to read the record of her thoughts in the shadows that came and went within her eyes. She was weighing her husband's qualities and possibilities in the scales of this unexpected opinion, and the decision hung suspended in the balance. As he divined her secret struggle and realised that she might go back to the man who did not love her, who wished to use her for his own advancement, he suffered an agony of jealousy that was well-nigh insupportable.
For a few moments she delayed to answer, toying with her fork in thoughtful abstraction. In fact, her love for the young astronomer beside her was contending with the old desire to control her husband and to make him a figure in the world. In the inmost recesses of her heart she knew that she no longer loved Emmet, and that they could never wholly meet. What she did not, perhaps, so frankly own was the fact that she had found too late the man she could have loved and for whom she should have waited. With him she had common social experiences and religious traditions, and time had taught her the value of these things she had once imagined she despised. But, after all, it was the right man against the wrong man, irrespective of such considerations. Now that Emmet was mayor, she found she did not care; the prize was an apple of Sodom in her hand. He had even lost the picturesqueness which appeared to be his in another sphere, without gaining in compensation the things that were Leigh's by inheritance. The argument went against him now, if that could be called an argument which was only a question of love. She looked up finally with a smile that seemed to indicate indifference, or the weary shelving of a long vexed question.
"Perhaps you are right," she answered. "I 'm sure I don't presume to say."