The wave of faintness passed; presently, out of a tangled confusion of sound she distinguished the notes of a voice familiar and yet strange, a voice whose magnetism seemed to have drawn every soul in the hall to one central spot on the platform. Her tired brain righted itself by sheer strength of will. She meant to notice every detail; next morning he would expect her to know just what portions of his speech had told, how the crowd had taken this and that dubious point. She called up every faculty of criticism and judgment in view of his demand, weighing and balancing, like an opponent, the new line Farquharson had taken, his methods, his choice of language, his rare actions—not with those of the average politician, not even with an acknowledged master of debate like Beadon, but with the orator of the evening, the man who, since Gladstone’s death, had been known as the best speaker in the House of Commons. And as she listened her thoughts swept back to all that she had read of other statesmen—Pitt, Burke, Peel, Palmerston, Bright, Cobden, Disraeli and Gladstone—men whose names lived still in England, and would live for ever. For Farquharson beat his leader. His was the real gift of oratory, form combined with substance, a flow of eloquence and imagination kept in check by reason—the Heaven-sent inspiration which comes, perhaps, to half-a-dozen men within the century. His audience did not applaud—applause would have interrupted. They listened spell-bound, every thought given up to the quiet figure on the platform, who made use neither of sensational phrase nor dramatic gesture, but held them by sheer force of brain and personality, as he marshalled an array of facts against which there seemed to be no appeal. "The mantle of Elijah..." said Lady Wereminster below her breath. But Evelyn did not answer. Through her opera-glasses she saw the tears of pride on Calvert’s cheeks and Creagh’s delighted expression—"Wasn’t I right this time, you fellows?" she could almost hear him say. There was a tender smile on Hare’s face as he turned in Evelyn’s direction and nodded, bringing the palms of his hands together in noiseless applause at the same time. And she saw more still. A wonderful light had leapt in Farquharson’s eyes as he bowed his acknowledgments; the light which, having once seen, no woman can mistake, as he looked straight at her and through her, as though laying his triumph at her feet. There was a voice in her ear. "Ex-cel-lent," whispered Brand. "You’ve done very well, my dear. I’ll make it worth your while." He stooped down and patted the disarranged lace of her fichu with the air of a proprietor. "I saw that look. There’s not much I don’t see, you know. But I’m an amenable husband, and won’t interfere; indeed, if you go on playing your hand as well as you’re playing it now, I shall have nothing to complain of. Whatever happens, you are to keep in with Farquharson—do you hear? Whatever happens, mind!"