“Was it really you,” she said, “who taught my son (she would not call him Paul again) all the nonsense he has been talking to us? Yes, indeed it is great nonsense, Mr. Spears--you must let me say so. We are doing no one injustice. My husband says all young men are Radicals one time or other; but I should have expected you, a man with children of your own, to know better. Oh no, I don’t want to argue. I am not clever enough for that. Let me give you another cup of tea.” The demagogue stared at the beautiful lady as if he could not believe his ears. Partly he was humiliated, seeing that she was not in the least afraid of him, and even did not realise at all what was the terrible disclosure he had made. This gave him that sense of having made himself ridiculous which is so intolerable to those who are unaccustomed to the world. He cast a jealous look round the table to see if he could detect any laughter. Paul caught him by the arm at this critical moment. “Eat your breakfast,” he said, in a wrathful undertone. “Do you hear, Spears? Do you think _she_ knows? Have some of this fish, for Heaven’s sake, and shut up. What on earth do they care if you taught me or not? Do you think she goes into all that?” Nobody heard this but Harry, who was listening both with ears and eyes. And Mr. Spears returned to his breakfast as commanded. He was abashed, and he was astonished, but still he made a very hearty meal when all was said. And by and by his spirit rose again; in the eyes of this lady, who had so completely got the better of him, far more than if she had turned him out, there was no way of redeeming himself, but by “bringing her over.” That would be a triumph. He immediately addressed himself to it with every art at his command. He had an extremely prepossessing and melodious voice, and he spoke with what the ladies thought a kind of old-fashioned grace. The somewhat stiff, stilted phraseology of the self-educated has always more or less a whiff of the formality of an older age. And he made observations which interested them, in spite of themselves. Lady Markham was very polite to her son’s friend. When the children reminded her of her promise to go with them on a long-planned expedition into the woods, she put them off. “You know I cannot leave when I have visitors,” she said.