d.

MRS. FARRANT. [_Gracefully giving him a good-bye hand._] And a successful
one, I hope.

FARRANT. We talked Education for half an hour.

MRS. FARRANT. [_Her eyebrows lifting a shade._] Education!

FARRANT. Then Trebell went away to work.

BLACKBOROUGH. I've missed the music, I fear.

MRS. FARRANT. But it's been Bach.

BLACKBOROUGH. No Chopin?

MRS. FARRANT. For a minute only.

BLACKBOROUGH. Why don't these new Italian men write things for the piano!
Good-night, Lady Davenport.

LADY DAVENPORT. [_As he bows over her hand._] And what has Education to do
with it?

BLACKBOROUGH. [_Non-committal himself._] Perhaps it was a subject that
compromised nobody.

LADY DAVENPORT. Do you think my daughter has been wasting her time and her
tact?

FARRANT. [_Clapping him on the shoulder._] Blackborough's frankly
flabbergasted at the publicity of this intrigue.

MRS. FARRANT. Intrigue! Mr. Trebell walked across the House ... actually
into your arms.

BLACKBOROUGH. [_With a certain dubious grimness._] Well ... we've had some
very interesting talks since. And his views upon Education are quite ...
Utopian. Good bye, Miss Trebell.

FRANCES TREBELL. Good-bye.

MRS. FARRANT. I wouldn't be so haughty till after the election, if I were
you, Mr. Blackborough.

BLACKBOROUGH. [_Indifferently._] Oh, I'm glad he's with us on the Church
question ... so far.

MRS. FARRANT. So far as you've made up your minds? The electoral cat will
jump soon.

BLACKBOROUGH. [_A little beaten by such polite cynicism._] Well ... our
conservative principles! After all we know what they are. Good-night, Mrs.
O'Connell.

AMY O'CONNELL. Good-night.

FARRANT. Your neuralgia better?

AMY O'CONNELL. By fits and starts.

FARRANT. [_Robustly._] Come and play billiards. Horsham and Maconochie
started a game. They can neither of them play. We left them working out a
theory of angles on bits of paper.

WALTER KENT. Professor Maconochie lured me on to golf yesterday. He doesn't
suffer from theories about that.

BLACKBOROUGH. [_With approval._] Started life as a caddie.

WALTER KENT. [_Pulling a wry face._] So he told me after the first hole.

BLACKBOROUGH. What's this, Kent, about Trebell's making you his secretary?

WALTER KENT. He thinks he'll have me.

BLACKBOROUGH. [_Almost reprovingly._] No question of politics?

FARRANT. More intrigue, Blackborough.

WALTER KENT. [_With disarming candour._] The truth is, you see, I haven't
any a