revolution, there was nothing for it but garden cities. She had heard he
was so cutting and ferocious that he really did seem as if he hated
his opponents. She hoped he would get a chance--perhaps Felix could
encourage him.

"What about the women?" Stanley asked suddenly. "Will they stand a
political powwow? One must think of them a bit."

Clara had. She was taking a farewell look at herself in the far-away
mirror through the door into her bedroom. It was a mistake--she
added--to suppose that women were not interested in 'the Land.' Lady
Britto was most intelligent, and Mildred Malloring knew every cottage on
her estate.

"Pokes her nose into 'em often enough," Stanley muttered.

Lady Fanfar again, and Mrs. Sleesor, and even Hilda Martlett, were
interested in their husbands, and Miss Bawtrey, of course, interested in
everything. As for Maude Ughtred, all talk would be the same to her; she
was always week-ending. Stanley need not worry--it would be all right;
some real work would get done, some real advance be made. So saying, she
turned her fine shoulders twice, once this way and once that, and went
out. She had never told even Stanley her ambition that at Becket, under
her aegis, should be laid the foundation-stone of the real scheme,
whatever it might be, that should regenerate 'the Land.' Stanley would
only have laughed; even though it would be bound to make him Lord
Freeland when it came to be known some day....

To the eyes and ears of Nedda that evening at dinner, all was new
indeed, and all wonderful. It was not that she was unaccustomed to