Nancy, resolved not to smile, found herself smiling. Not so much at what he said, as at the manner of it. Her resentment was falling away; she felt the influence of this imperturbable geniality. ‘Shall I tell you my theory?’ He talked with less reserve than on the last occasion when they had sat together. The mellow sunlight, the garden odours, the warm, still air, favoured a growth of intimacy. ‘By all means,’ was Nancy’s reply. ‘We must begin by admitting that the ordinary woman hates nothing so much as to have another woman set in authority over her.’ He paused, and laughed lazily. ‘Now, before the triumph of glorious Democracy, only those women kept servants who were capable of rule,--who had by birth the instinct of authority. They knew themselves the natural superiors of their domestics, and went through an education fitting them to rule. Things worked very well; no servant-difficulty existed. Now-a-days, every woman who can afford it must have another woman to wait upon her, no matter how silly, or vulgar, or depraved she may be; the result, of course, is a spirit of rebellion in the kitchen. Who could have expected anything else?’ Nancy played with a dandelion she had plucked, and gave sign neither of assent nor disagreement. ‘Mrs. Bellamy,’ continued the young man, ‘marvels that servants revolt against her. What could be more natural? The servants have learnt that splendid doctrine that every one is as good as everybody else, and Mrs. Bellamy is by no means the person to make them see things differently. And this kind of thing is going on in numberless houses--an utterly incompetent mistress and a democratic maid in spirited revolt. The incompetents, being in so vast a majority, will sooner or later spoil all the servants in the country.’ ‘You should make an article of it,’ said Nancy, ‘and send it to _The Nineteenth Century_.’ ‘So I might.’ He paused, and added casually, ‘You read _The Nineteenth Century_?’ ‘Now and then.’ Nancy felt herself an impostor, for of leading reviews she knew little more than the names. And Tarrant’s look, so steady, yet so good-tempered, disturbed her conscience with the fear that he saw through her. She was coming wretchedly out of this dialogue, in which she had meant to make a figure. He changed the subject; was it merely to spare her? ‘Shall you go to Teignmouth again this year?’ ‘I don’t know yet. I think not.’ Silence followed. Tarrant, to judge from his face, was absorbed in pleasant thought; Nancy, on the other hand, felt so ill at ease that she was on the point of rising, when his voice checked her. ‘I have an idea’--he spoke dreamily--‘of going to spend next winter in the Bahamas.’ ‘Why the Bahamas?’