The suffragette tried to rearrange her looks, which certainly needed it. There are two sorts of women, the women before whom you feel you must be tidy and the women before whom such things don’t matter. Mrs. Rust all her life had belonged to the former, all her life what charm she had, had lain in the terror she inspired. For the first time the gardener questioned himself as to his plan of attack. Hitherto he had pinned his faith to inspiration. He had left the matter in the hands of his private god, Chance. His methods were very simple, as well as bizarre. His mind was a tortuous path, but he followed it straightforwardly, and never looked back. To do him justice, however, I must say that he searched his repertoire for a suitable point of conversational contact with Mrs. Rust. Finding none, he dispensed with that luxury. “I am the ship’s gardener,” he said, smiling at his intended victim. Mrs. Rust was broad, and the deck-chair was narrow. It was some time before a compromise between these two facts could be arrived at, so the remark came upon her at a moment of some stress. “Now, then, what was that you were saying?” she asked at last, in an unpromising voice. The gardener, who was very literal in very small things, repeated his information, word for word, and inflection for inflection. “I am the ship’s gardener.” Mrs. Rust grunted. She showed no tolerance for the thing that was not sensational. Nor had she any discrimination in her search for the novelty. Still, energy is something. “But I am only ship’s gardener in theory,” persisted the gardener. “In practice I don’t even know where the watering-can is kept.” “Then you are here under false pretences,” retorted Mrs. Rust a little more genially, for his last remark was not everybody’s remark. “I am,” said the gardener, suddenly catching a fleeting perspective of the path to her good graces. “Good,” said Mrs. Rust, and turned her little bright eyes upon him. When she opened her eyes very wide, it meant that she was on the track of what she sought. When she shut them, as she often did, it meant that she did not understand what was said. But it gave the fortunate impression that she understood only too well. She was instinctively ingenious at hiding her own limitations. It was the end of that interview, but a good beginning to the campaign.