Anthony Hope - A Change of Air

Perhaps it was a woebegone look about the Doctor that made Philip Hume take the chair next him after dinner, while Dale was, still as if in play, emitting anarchist sparks for the Colonel's entertainment.

"Is it possible," asked the Doctor in low, half-angry tones, "that he thinks these people are any good – that they are sincere or thorough in the matter? He's wasting his time."

"Well, well, my dear fellow, we must all dine, whatever our opinions."

"Oh, yes; we must dine, while the world starves."

"The bow can't be always stretched," said Philip, with a slight smile.

"You don't think, Hume, do you, that he's getting any less – less in earnest, you know?"

"Oh, he wrote a scorcher this very morning."

"Did he? That's good news. Where is it to appear?"

"I don't know. He didn't write it on commission."

"His poems have such magnificent restlessness, haven't they? I can't bear to see him idle."

"Poor Dale! You must give him some holidays. He likes pleasure like the rest of us."

The Doctor sighed impatiently, and Philip looking at him anxiously, laid a hand on his arm.

"Roberts," he said, "there is no need that you should be ground to powder."

"I don't understand."

"I hope you never will. Your wife doesn't look very strong. Why don't you give her a change?"

"A change? How am I to afford a change? Besides, who wants a change? What change do most workers get?"

"Hang most workers! Your wife wants a change."

"I haven't got the money, anyhow."

"Then there's an end of it."

The Colonel rose, and they made for the drawing room.

Philip detained his companion for a moment.

"Well?" said the Doctor, feeling the touch on his arm.

"For God's sake, old fellow, go slow," said Philip, pressing his arm, and looking at him with an appealing smile.

When Mrs. Delane came back from London, she was met with a question of the precise kind on which she felt herself to be no mean authority. It was a problem of propriety, of etiquette, and of the usages of society, and Mrs. Delane attacked it with a due sense of its importance and with the pleasure of an expert. It arose out of Dale Bannister's call at the Grange. Dale had been accustomed, when a lady found favor in his eyes, to inform her of the gratifying news through the medium of a set of verses, more or less enthusiastic and rhapsodic in their nature. The impulse to follow his usual practice was strong on him after meeting Janet Delane, and issued in the composition of that poem called "To a Pretty Saint," the title of which Nellie had seen. He copied it out fair, and was about to put it in the post when a thought suddenly struck him. Miss Delane was not quite like most of his acquaintances. It was perhaps possible that she might think his action premature, or even impertinent, and that she might deem it incumbent on her to resent being called either a saint or pretty by a friend of one interview's standing. Dale was divided between his newborn doubt of his own instinct of what was permissible and his great reluctance to doom his work to suppression. He decided to consult Philip Hume, who was, as he knew, more habituated to the social atmosphere of places like Denshire.

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