This was very interesting, of course, but she knew that he had not asked her to walk with him solely to discuss the vicissitudes of coasts towns. Still, they had gone on for quite half a mile before they had exhausted the topic, and seated themselves on one of the new chairs on the end of the concrete path. Even then he did not speak about Mr. Forrester and his mission for some time. At last he said casually: “What brought that chap down to me to-day, do you fancy?” “He came to you because he knows that you are the sort of member that the Nuttingford people want,” she replied with the utmost promptitude. “Bless my heart and soul! Why should they be such fools? You mustn’t believe all that old F. F. tells you, my girl.” “All? I don’t think that he could induce me to believe a quarter of what he says,” she replied. “But I’m positive that he believes you would have a better chance of being elected than anyone who is likely to come forward. What I felt from the first moment that he broached the subject was that he and his Party are somehow in a tight place in regard to the Nuttingford division. It occurred to me that someone whom they expected to come forward had thrown them over, and for some reason or other he thought that he might fall back on you. I wouldn’t go as far as to say that he expects you to win, but he expects you to make a good show for the Party on the day of the election; and so you will, Jack, only you’ll be at the head of the poll.” He jumped up from the seat as if he had been stung by a wasp. “What do you mean?” he cried after a long pause, which he utilized in collecting himself. “Do you mean to think for a moment that I would make such a fool of myself as to go among strange people for the sake of getting a licking at a cost of a thousand pounds or so?” “My dearest boy, I want you to go in for this business if only for the sake of showing that clever, far-seeing man that you’re not quite such a fool as he fancies.” “The best way I could do that would be by laughing at him as I did.” “There’s a better way still: take him at his word--a little better than his word--and amaze him by getting returned. He doesn’t believe that you could get returned for the division, but he thinks, as I said, that you will make a good fight for it. Now you must pull yourself together and fight every ounce there’s in you. Jack, you _must_ do it, out of compliment to me.” “Look here, my girl, you are making a man of me--I know that. Didn’t I call you my guardian--my good angel--once upon a time? Well, so you are--so you showed yourself to be; but are you not going ahead with me a little too fast?” She rose from the seat and put her arm within one of his arms. “Let us stroll on a little farther,” she said. “I don’t like it,” he said. “Just beyond that iron railing there is the cliff and some horrid rocks below. If we walk on through that railing we shall come a cropper among the rocks. See?”