“Neither would I,” said Stella emphatically. “Mister Alfred Hesketh may pass in an English crowd, but over here he’s just an ignorant young man, and you’d better not have him talking with his mouth at any of your meetings. Tell him to go and play with Walter Winter.”
“I heard he was asking at Volunteer Headquarters the other night,” remarked Alec, “how long it would be before a man like himself, if he threw in his lot with the country, could expect to get nominated for a provincial seat.”
“What did they tell him?” asked Mr Murchison, when they had finished their laugh.
“I heard they said it would depend a good deal on the size of the lot.”
“And a little on the size of the man,” remarked Advena.
“He said he would be willing to take a seat in a Legislature and work up,” Alec went on. “Ontario for choice, because he thought the people of this Province more advanced.”
“There’s a representative committee being formed to give the inhabitants of the poor-house a turkey dinner on Thanksgiving Day,” said Advena. “He might begin with that.”
“I dare say he would if anybody told him. He’s just dying to be taken into the public service,” Alec said. “He’s in dead earnest about it. He thinks this country’s a great place because it gives a man the chance of a public career.”
“Why is it,” asked Advena “that when people have no capacity for private usefulness they should be so anxious to serve the public?”
“Oh, come,” said Lorne, “Hesketh has an income of his own. Why should he sweat for his living? We needn’t pride ourselves on being so taken up with getting ours. A man like that is in a position to do some good, and I hope Hesketh will get a chance if he stays over here. We’ll soon see how he speaks. He’s going to follow Farquharson at Jordanville on Thursday week.”