Francesca, with Spartan stoicism, continued to wear an ingratiating 
smile, though the character of the deaf adder that stoppeth her ear 
and will not hearken, seemed to her at that moment a beautiful one.

Sir Julian Jull had been a member of a House of Commons 
distinguished for its high standard of well-informed mediocrity, 
and had harmonised so thoroughly with his surroundings that the 
most attentive observer of Parliamentary proceedings could scarcely 
have told even on which side of the House he sat.  A baronetcy 
bestowed on him by the Party in power had at least removed that 
doubt; some weeks later he had been made Governor of some West 
Indian dependency, whether as a reward for having accepted the 
baronetcy, or as an application of a theory that West Indian 
islands get the Governors they deserve, it would have been hard to 
say.  To Sir Julian the appointment was, doubtless, one of some 
importance; during the span of his Governorship the island might 
possibly be visited by a member of the Royal Family, or at the 
least by an earthquake, and in either case his name would get into 
the papers.  To the public the matter was one of absolute 
indifference; "who is he and where is it?" would have correctly 
epitomised the sum total of general information on the personal and 
geographical aspects of the case.

Francesca, however, from the moment she had heard of the likelihood 
of the appointment, had taken a deep and lively interest in Sir 
Julian.  As a Member of Parliament he had not filled any very 
pressing social want in her life, and on the rare occasions when 
she took tea on the Terrace of the House she was wont to lapse into 
rapt contemplation of St. Thomas's Hospital whenever she saw him 
within bowing distance.  But as Governor of an island he would, of 
course, want a private secretary, and as a friend and colleague of 
Henry Greech, to whom he was indebted for many little acts of 
political support (they had once jointly drafted an amendment which 
had been ruled out of order), what was more natural and proper than 
that he should let his choice fall on Henry's nephew Comus?  While 
privately doubting whether the boy would make the sort of secretary 
that any public man would esteem as a treasure, Henry was 
thoroughly in agreement with Francesca as to the excellence and 
desirability of an arrangement which would transplant that 
troublesome' young animal from the too restricted and conspicuous 
area that centres in the parish of St. James's to some misty corner 
of the British dominion overseas.  Brother and sister had conspired 
to give an elaborate and at the same time cosy little luncheon to 
Sir Julian on the very day that his appointment was officially 
announced, and the question of the secretaryship had been mooted 
and sedulously fostered as occasion permitted, until all that was 
now needed to clinch the matter was a formal interview between His 
Excellency and Comus.  The boy had from the first shewn very little 
gratification at the prospect of his deportation.  To live on a 
remote shark-girt island, as he expressed it, with the Jull family 
as his chief social mainstay, and Sir Julian's conversation as a 
daily item of his existence, did not inspire him with the same 
degree of enthusiasm as was displayed by his mother and uncle, who, 
after all, were not making the experiment.  Even the necessity for 
an entirely new outfit did not appeal to his imagination with the 
force that might have been expected.  But, however lukewarm his 
adhesion to the project might be, Francesca and her brother were 
clearly determined that no lack of deft persistence on their part 
should endanger its success.  It was for the purpose of reminding 
Sir Julian of his promise to meet Comus at lunch on the following 
day, and definitely settle the matter of the secretaryship that 
Francesca was now enduring the ordeal of a long harangue on the 
value of the West Indian group as an Imperial asset.  Other 
listeners dexterously detached themselves one by one, but 
Francesca's patience outlasted even Sir Julian's flow of 
commonplaces, and her devotion was duly rewarded by a renewed 
acknowledgment of the lunch engagement and its purpose.  She pushed 
her way back through the throng of starling-voiced chatterers 
fortified by a sense of well-earned victory.  Dear Serena's absurd 
SALONS served some good purpose after all.

Francesca was not an early riser and her breakfast was only just 
beginning to mobilise on the breakfast-table next morning when a 
copy of THE TIMES, sent by special messenger from her brother's 
house, was brought up to her room.  A heavy margin of blue 
pencilling drew her attention to a prominently-printed letter which 
bore the ironical heading: "Julian Jull, Proconsul."  The matter of 
the letter was a cruel dis-interment of some fatuous and forgotten 
speeches made by Sir Julian to his constituents not many years ago, 
in which the value of some of our Colonial possessions, 
particularly certain West Indian islands, was decried in a medley 
of pomposity, ignorance and amazingly cheap humour.  The extracts 
given sounded weak and foolish enough, taken by themselves, but the 
writer of the letter had interlarded them with comments of his own, 
which sparkled with an ironical brilliance that was Cervantes-like 
in its polished cruelty.  Remembering her ordeal of the previous 
evening Francesca permitted herself a certain feeling of amusement 
as she read the merciless stabs inflicted on the newly-appointed 
Governor; then she came to the signature at the foot of the letter, 
and the laughter died out of her eyes.  "Comus Bassington" stared 
at her from above a thick layer of blue pencil lines marked by 
Henry Greech's shaking hand.

Comus could no more have devised such a letter than he could have 
written an Episcopal charge to the clergy of any given diocese.  It 
was obviously the work of Courtenay Youghal, and Comus, for a 
palpable purpose of his own, had wheedled him into foregoing for 
once the pride of authorship in a clever piece of political 
raillery, and letting his young friend stand sponsor instead.  It 
was a daring stroke, and there could be no question as to its