"Then let's put it off—till to-morrow!" said Meadows, as he rose, still smiling. "It is most kind of you, but I really must write my letters, and my brains are pulp. But I will escort you through the garden, if I may."
His hostess turned sharply, and walked back towards the front of the house where Sir Luke and Mr. Frome, a young and rising Under-Secretary, were waiting for her. Meadows accompanied her, but found her exceedingly ungracious. She did, however, inform him, as they followed the other two towards the exit from the garden, that she had come to the conclusion that the subject he was proposing for his second series of lectures, to be given at Dunstable House during the winter, "would never do."
"Famous Controversies of the Nineteenth Century—political and religious." The very sound of it was enough to keep people away! "What people expect from you is talk about persons—not ideas. Ideas are not your line!"
Meadows flushed a little. What his "line" might be, he said, he had not yet discovered. But he liked his subject, and meant to stick to it.
Lady Dunstable turned on him a pair of sarcastic eyes.
"That's so like you clever people. You would die rather than take advice."
"Advice!—yes. As much as you like, dear lady. But—"
"But what—" she asked, imperatively, nettled in her turn.
"Well—you must put it prettily!" said Meadows, smiling. "We want a great deal of jam with the powder."
"You want to be flattered? I never flatter! It is the most despicable of arts."