“I beg your pardon,” interrupted Francis. “I said—although _Punch_ is a humorous paper.” Francis, feeling satire useless with a creature of this type, gave up the struggle. Hubert accepted an egg, as less liable than lobster to impede talk; and continued his harangue. Peter, who knew that Rawlings, despite his personal unpleasantness, possessed knowledge, listened interestedly—asking a question every now and then. The others started a conversation on their own. Said Violet, monopolizing it, “Oh but we _never_ leave London while the ‘House’ is sitting. I think politics so interesting, Mr. Gordon. Don’t you? Though I suppose as an author—_so_ clever, that last poem of yours—you take more interest in the affairs of the heart.” She ruffled herself; rattled on. “But of course, politics are _the thing_ nowadays. I’m afraid”—her voice dropped to the confidential whisper of the person who has no news to impart—“we’re going to have _trouble_. Not with Servia, of course: but in Ireland. _People_ are saying. . . .” “Amazing,” thought Francis, “how a nice woman like Pat. can have such a sister.” Smith, bringing the joint, interrupted the Rawlings duo in their monologues. “I always wonder,” went on Hubert a few minutes later, “why you didn’t take your brother into partnership. He seemed an awfully nice fellow, the only time I met him.” “Arthur?” queried Peter. “Why, Arthur wouldn’t take a partnership in Rothschilds! He ran away from school when he was fifteen; and he’s been running from somewhere or other ever since. The last time I heard from him, he was in the Dutch Indies—planting. Wrote to ask my opinion about tobacco prospects in Java. Beastly stuff, Javanese tobacco; though they use a lot of it for making so-called Borneo cigars.” Luncheon over, Peter and Patricia challenged the two men at tennis: Violet, languid in a long chair, alternately watched the match; and picked her way expertly through _The Tatler_. To see her own photograph in that periodical, not once but regularly, was a small part of Violet’s many unrealized ambitions: which included a knighthood and a seat in the House of Commons for her husband, a Rolls-Royce limousine (painted black and white for preference) for herself, and all the usual appurtenances of the politico-parisitical set which both of them alternatively aped and envied. Neither she nor her husband belonged to the class who “didn’t want anything in particular”! Peter, playing brilliantly at the net, and Patricia, backing him up accurately from the base-line, defeated their opponents in three straight setts. Followed tea, a languid paddle towards Shiplake, the dressing-gong, stiff shirts and low frocks, auction bridge. . . .