Now, since her drive in the Park a few days before, and the discovery attendant thereon that efforts were necessary, a militant spirit had possessed Mildred. She was seen everywhere, at her loudest and most characteristic; she had simply summoned Maud from the retirement at Windsor, she had secured a record party for next Sunday, and for the sake of general completeness she had determined, in spite of Lady Ardingly, to ask Jack and Marie. The notice was very short, and, instead of writing a note, she drove round this morning to Park Lane to deliver her invitation verbatim; she likewise wished, in case Marie was in, to air a few poisonous nothings, scouts, as it were, of her advancing armies. And arriving at this moment, she was admitted and shown upstairs. "Dearest Marie, it is ages, simply ages!" she began. "I have come to supplicate. Do come down to Windsor from Saturday till Monday. You shall not be bored; there is Guardina to sing to you, and the place really looks too lovely. Maud has been describing it to me; she came up yesterday. And there are half the Front Bench coming on Sunday. It might be useful for Jack to be there. My dear, what do you think of Jack's speech? However, about Saturday first." "I don't think we can," said Marie. "We have already refused two Saturday parties on the plea of-- If I only could remember the plea it might be more hopeful. Political plea, I think." "That's just right, then," said Mildred. "Jack will have a quiet talk with the old gang. Besides, Marie, if one only saw you on the days when you had not refused an invitation, I should not know you by sight in a year. So you'll come." "Well, I think 'political' covers it," she said. "I shall be charmed if Jack has made no other arrangement. And his speech. What do you think of it?" Mildred held up her hands in despairing deprecation. "I thought I should have died," she said. "It is too sad when you see a clever man industriously digging his own grave. One always does it eventually by mistake, but on purpose like that, and with his eyes open!" "Did it strike you so?" "Surely, and the ridiculous point is that Jim said almost precisely the same things down at Freshfield." "That surely, then, is, as far as it goes, as the Times would say, in favour of both of them," remarked Marie. "To my mind, there is a new party in birth. You may call it Imperial, I suppose. It is far from Jingo. Jack's speech is the antithesis of Jingoism; it is also not--well, Northamptonish. It is beginning to roar as every well-conducted baby should." Mildred's appetite for politics was at all times bird-like. She pecked and hopped away. On this occasion she hopped away to a considerable distance. "I have seen a good deal of Jim lately," she said. "In fact, I am afraid I have been seeing a little too much." "You mean you are getting tired of him?" asked Marie, who, from having been rather absent, was now intent and alert.