enabled him to have a friend to lunch or dine in decent
circumstances without undue expense, and supplied him with very good
stationery for his correspondence. Moreover, it pleasantly enlarged
his acquaintance. At the club he had got to know Lord Dymchurch, a
month or two ago, and this connection he did not undervalue. His
fellow members, it is true, were not, for the most part, men of the
kind with whom Dyce greatly cared to talk; as yet, they did not seem
much impressed with his conversational powers; but Lord Dymchurch
promised to be an exception, and of him Dyce had already a very high
opinion.

After an hour or so of smoking and musing and mental vacillation, he
sat down to write his letter. "Dear Miss Connie," he began. It was
the name by which he addressed Miss Bride in the old days, and it
seemed good to him to preserve their former relations as far as
possible; for Constance, though a strange sort of girl, nowadays
decidedly cold and dry, undeniably had brains, and might still be
capable of appreciating him. "Yesterday I had to come back to town
in a hurry, owing to the receipt of some disagreeable news, so of
necessity I postponed my visit to Hollingford. It occurs to me that
I had better ask whether you were serious in your suggestion that
Lady Ogram might be glad to make my acquaintance. I know nothing
whatever about her, except what you told me on our walk to the
station, so cannot be sure whether she is likely to take any real
interest in my ideas. Our time together was too short for me to
explain my stand-point; perhaps I had better say a word or two about
it now. I am a Socialist--but not a Social-democrat; democracy
(which, for the rest, has never existed) I look upon as an absurdity
condemned by all the teachings of modern science. I am a Socialist,
for I believe that the principle of association is the only