"I knew," I said, "that you could not listen to ... to the sort of
thing. But there were reasons. I felt forced. You will forgive me." He
looked up at me, starting as if he had forgotten my presence.

"Yes, yes," he said, "I have a certain--I can't think of the right
word--say respect--for your judgment and--and motives ... But you see,
there are, for instance, my colleagues. I couldn't go to them ..." He
lost the thread of his idea.

"To tell the truth," I said, with a sudden impulse for candour, "it
isn't the political aspect of the matter, but the personal. I spoke
because it was just possible that I might be of service to
you--personally--and because I would like you ... to make a good fight
for it." I had borrowed her own words.

He looked up at me and smiled. "Thank you," he said. "I believe you
think it's a losing game," he added, with a touch of gray humour that
was like a genial hour of sunlight on a wintry day. I did not answer. A
little way down the road Miss Churchill's carriage whirled into sight,
sparkling in the sunlight, and sending up an attendant cloud of dust
that melted like smoke through the dog-roses of the leeward hedge.

"So you don't think much of me as a politician," Churchill suddenly
deduced smilingly. "You had better not tell that to my aunt."

I went up to town with Churchill that evening. There was nothing waiting
for me there, but I did not want to think. I wanted to be among men,
among crowds of men, to be dazed, to be stupefied, to hear nothing for
the din of life, to be blinded by the blaze of lights.