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There was a pause, Percy continued to eat in silence. Mary and Hester smiled at one another, as if to say, 'Men are very clever! It is a debate where our merely feminine views would be de trop.'

The host wiped his mouth and pushed his chair back. 'Your two cardinal points,' he began, 'may or may not be of the decisive character that you attribute to them. I am not competent to judge. What I do know is that I should be indeed sorry should the pact not materialize.'

'I too.' René vigorously nodded his head.

'What is more,' Percy continued, 'the situation would then be of the utmost gravity.'

'I agree, it could hardly be graver. For ten years now we have carefully progressed, as if that were our aim, into this terrible situation. It seems to me, in all seriousness, that there has been a great deal of deliberation in getting ourselves tied up in a worse and worse position from which nothing can disengage us.'

Percy stared at him. 'Do I understand you to say that it was on purpose that we find ourselves in this highly dangerous situation?'