"You are a strange woman," he said. "In a few months' time, when you are back in the thick of it all, you will be as anxious to have him there as we are. You will not be able to understand how you could ever have wished differently. This is rank sentiment, you know, which you have been talking. Mannering here is a wasted power. His life is an unnatural one."
"How do you know? Will he be as happy, I wonder, when you have gone, when there is no longer a Mrs. Handsell? I think not! You are one of the first to whom I should have looked for help in this matter. You owe it to us. We have a right to demand it. For myself personally I have no life now outside the life political. I am tired of being in opposition. I want to hold office. One mounts the ladder very slowly. I see my way in a few months to going up two rungs at a time. We want Mannering. We must have him. Don't force me to make that slip of the tongue."
The sound of a gong came through the open window. She rose to her feet.
"We are keeping them waiting for luncheon," she remarked. "I will think over what you have said."
Sir Leslie carefully closed the iron gate behind him, and looked around.
"You may be a great politician, Sir Leslie," she declared, "but you are no gardener. Roses don't bloom out of doors in May--not in these parts at any rate."
"I understand," he assented, humbly. "This is where the roses will be."
"That wall, you see," she explained, "keeps off the north winds, and the chestnut grove the east. There is sun here all the day long. You should come to Blakely in two months' time, Sir Leslie. Everything is so different then."
"You forget, my dear child," he murmured, "that you are speaking to a slave."
"A slave!" she repeated. "How absurd! You are a Cabinet Minister, are you not, Sir Leslie?"
"I was once," he answered, "until an ungrateful country grew weary of the monotony of perfect government and installed our opponents in our places. Just now we are in opposition."
"In opposition," she repeated, a little vaguely.
"Meaning," he explained, "that we get all the fun, no responsibility, and, alas, no pay."
"How fascinating," she exclaimed. "Do sit down here, and tell me all about it. But I forgot. You are not used to sitting down out of doors. Perhaps you will catch cold."