"And you think that settles it--the eagerness of the cheap life to be allowed to maim and waste itself? But again and again English law has stepped in to prevent it--and again and again everybody has been thankful." "It is all a question of balance, of course," said George. "Must a few unwise people be allowed to kill themselves--or thousands lose their liberty?" His blue eyes scanned her beautiful impetuous face with a certain cool hardness. Internally he was more and more in revolt against a "monstrous regiment of women" and the influence upon the most complex economic problems of such a personality as that before him. But his word "liberty" pricked her. The look of feeling passed away. Her eyes kindled as sharply and drily as his own. "Freedom?--let me quote you Cromwell! 'Every sectary saith, "O give me liberty!" But give it him, and to the best of his power he will yield it to no one else.' So with your careless or brutal employer--give him liberty, and no one else shall get it." "Only by metaphor--not legally," said George, stubbornly. "So long as men are not slaves by law there is always a chance for freedom. Any way _we_ stand for freedom--as an end, not a means. It is not the business of the State to make people happy--not at all!--at least that is our view--but it _is_ the business of the State to keep them free." "Ah!" said Bennett, with a long breath, "there you've hit the nail--the whole difference between you and us." George nodded. Lady Maxwell did not speak immediately. But George was conscious that he was being observed, closely considered. Their glances crossed an instant, in antagonism, certainly, if not in dislike. "How long is it since you came home from India?" she asked him suddenly. "About six months." "And you were, I think, a long time abroad?" "Nearly four years. Does that make you think I have not had much time to get up the things I am going to vote about?" said the young man, laughing. "I don't know! On the broadest issues of politics, one makes up one's mind as well in Asia as in Europe--better perhaps." "On the Empire, I suppose--and England's place in the world? That's a side which--I know--I remember much too little. You think our life depends on a governing class--and that _we_ and democracy are weakening that class too much?" "That's about it. And for democracy it is all right. But _you_--you are the traitors!" His thrust, however, did not rouse her to any corresponding rhetoric. She smiled merely, and began to question him about his travels. She did it with great deftness, so that after an answer or two both his temper and manner insensibly softened, and he found himself talking with ease and success. His mixed personality revealed itself--his capacity for certain veiled enthusiasms, his respect for power, for knowledge, his pessimist beliefs as to the average lot of men.