The child flung her arms about her. “You’re so beautiful and wonderful,” she said. “You can do anything. I’m so glad you came.” “That tells him to talk all that twaddle?” demanded Miss Ensor. “Have you heard him?”!

His work had taken him into the Desert, far from the beaten tracks. He described the life of the people, very little different from what it must have been in Noah’s time. For months he had been the only white man there, and had lived among them. What had struck him was how little he had missed all the paraphernalia of civilization, once he had got over the first shock. He had learnt their sports and games; wrestled and swum and hunted with them. Provided one was a little hungry and tired with toil, a stew of goat’s flesh with sweet cakes and fruits, washed down with wine out of a sheep’s skin, made a feast; and after, there was music and singing and dancing, or the travelling story-teller would gather round him his rapt audience. Paris had only robbed women of their grace and dignity. He preferred the young girls in their costume of the fourteenth dynasty. Progress, he thought, had tended only to complicate life and render it less enjoyable. All the essentials of happiness—love, courtship, marriage, the home, children, friendship, social intercourse, and play, were independent of it; had always been there for the asking. They lingered over the meal. Folk was a brilliant talker. Most of the men whose names were filling the newspapers had sat to him at one time or another. He made them seem quite human. Joan was surprised at the time.

The nurse was standing by the window. She turned sharply on Joan’s entrance. Joan slipped the box into her hands. “He will be all right in his proper place,” he answered: “as the servant of the public: told what to do, and turned out of his job if he doesn’t do it. My scheme does depend upon Protection. You can tell him that. But this time, it’s going to be Protection for the people.” “Yes,” said Joan. “Not any great number of them, not yet. But enough to show that I really am interesting them. It grows every week.”