our Cabinet, I should have been compelled to
decline it, just as I have declined that ridiculous offer of a peerage.
I have consented to lead the Democratic Party in the House of Commons."

The Prime Minister's fingers slipped slowly from the knob of the bell.
He was a person of studied deportment. A journalist who had once
written of his courtly manners had found himself before long the
sub-editor of a Government journal. At that moment he was possessed of
neither manners nor presence. He sat gazing at Tallente with his mouth
open. The latter rose to his feet.

"I ask you to believe, sir," he said, "that the step which I am taking
is in no way due to my feeling of pique or dissatisfaction with your
treatment. I go where I think I can do the best work for my country and
employ such gifts as I have to their best advantage."

"But you are out to ruin the country!" Horlock faltered. "The Democrats
are Socialists."

"From one point of view," Tallente rejoined, "every Christian is a
Socialist. The term means nothing. The programme of my new party aims
at the destruction of all artificial barriers which make prosperity easy
to one and difficult to another. It aims not only at the abolition of
great fortunes and trusts, but at the abolition of the conditions which
make them possible. It embraces a scheme for national service and a
reasonable imperialism. It has a sane programme, and that is more than
any Government which has been in office since the war has had."

Mr. Horlock rose to his feet.

"Tallente," he pronounced, "you are a traitor to your class and to your
country."

He struck the bell viciously. His visitor turned away with a faint
smile.

"Don't annoy me," he begged, "or I may some day have to send you to the
House of Lords!"

CHAPTER XI

Tallente, obeying an urgent telephone message, made his way to
Claridge's and sent his card up to his wife. Her maid came down and
invited him to her suite, an invitation which he promptly declined. In
about a quarter of an hour she descended to the lounge, dressed for the
street. She showed no signs of confusion or nervousness at his visit.
She was hard and cold and fair, with a fraudulent smile upon her lips,
dressed to perfection, her maid hovering in the background with a
Pekinese under one arm and a jewel case in her other hand.

"Thank goodness," she said, as she fluttered into a chair by his side,
"that you hate scenes even more than I do! You have the air