"Could you be a great nation if you were?"
"Perhaps not. England just now is a palimpsest--the new writing everywhere on top of the old. Yet it is the same parchment, and the old is there. Now you are writing on a fresh skin."
"But with the old ideas!" said Mariette, a flash in his dark eyes. "Church--State--family!--there is nothing else to write with."
The two men drew closer together, and plunged into conversation. Elizabeth was left solitary a moment, behind the tea-things. The buzz of the room, the hearty laugh of the Lord Lieutenant, reached the outer ear. But every deeper sense was strained to catch a voice--a step--that must soon be here. And presently across the room, her eyes met her mother's, and their two expectancies touched.
"Mother!--here is Mr. Anderson!"
Philip entered joyously, escorting his guest.
To Anderson's half-dazzled sight, the room, which was now fully lit by lamplight and fire, seemed crowded. He found himself greeted by a gentle grey-haired lady of fifty-five, with a strong likeness to a face he knew; and then his hand touched Elizabeth's. Various commonplaces passed between him and her, as to his journey, the new motor which had brought him to the house, the frosty evening. Mariette gave him a nod and smile, and he was introduced to various men who bowed without any change of expression, and to a girl, who smiled carelessly, and turned immediately towards Philip, hanging over the back of her chair.
Elizabeth pointed to a seat beside her, and gave him tea. They talked of London a little, and his first impressions. All the time he was trying to grasp the identity of the woman speaking with the woman he had parted from in Canada. Something surely had gone? This restrained and rather cold person was not the Elizabeth of the Rockies. He watched her when she turned from him to her other guests; her light impersonal manner towards the younger men, with its occasional touch of satire; the friendly relation between her and the parson; the kindly deference she showed the old Lord Lieutenant. Evidently she was mistress here, much more than her mother. Everything seemed to be referred to her, to circle round her.
Presently there was a stir in the room. Lord Waynflete asked for his carriage.
"Don't forget, my dear lady, that you open the new Town Hall next Wednesday," he said, as he made his way to Elizabeth.