"You ask of me more than I can answer."
"I beg of you!" he pleaded earnestly. "I have my reasons."
Again she bit her lip. It was too absurd, too ridiculous! That she, of all people, who had seen into the darkest, most sordid depths of the human character, and long since learned to look upon goodness and virtue as exploded myths, should be set to work to draw up an ideal which she did not and could not believe in, seemed a mockery too pitiful for laughter. Yet something—perhaps it was a form of national pride—stung her to the task, moreover stung her to do her best and place beyond the reach of these dark hands a high and splendid figure of English ideals.
To help herself, she sought through the lumber-rooms of her memory, and drew thence a hundred ideas, thoughts and conceptions which had belonged to a short—terribly short—childhood. Like a middle-aged woman who comes suddenly upon a hoard of long since forgotten toys, and feels an emotion half pitying, half regretful, so Beatrice Cary displayed to her companion things that for years had lain forsaken and neglected in the background of her mind. The dust lay thick upon them—and yet they were well enough. They would have been beautiful, had she believed in them, but, like the toys, they had lost the glamour and illusionary light in which her youth and imagination had bathed them.
"Our highest ideal of a man we call a gentleman," she said slowly. "It is a much-abused term, but it can mean a very great deal. What his appearance is does not so much matter—indeed, when one looks into it, it does not matter at all, save that you will find that the ugliest face can often give you an index to a lovely character. The chief thing that we require of him is that he should be above all meanness and pettiness. He must be great-thinking and great-feeling for himself and others, especially for others. You will find that a good man is always thinking or working for those others whose names he may not even know. Whatever power or talent he has—however little it may be—he concentrates on some object which may help them. It is the same with his virtues. He cultivates them because he knows that there is not a high thought, or generous impulse, or noble deed which does not help to lift the standard of the whole world."
"Of what virtues are you speaking?" Nehal Singh interposed.
"Oh, the usual things," she returned, with a note of cynicism breaking through her sham enthusiasm. "Honesty, purity, generosity, loyalty—especially loyalty. I do not think a man who is true to himself, to his word, to his friend, and to his country can ever fall far below the ideal." She took a deep breath. "It is a very poor description that I have given you. I hope you have understood?"
"Yes, I have understood," he answered. "And this man—this gentleman—can be of all nations?"
So deeply ingrained is national prejudice, even in those who profess to regard the whole world with an equally contemptuous eye, that for an instant she hesitated.
"Of course," she said then. "Nationality makes no difference."