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René made no further move, as though to allow his oracular statement to take effect (though he sincerely hoped that it might not); meanwhile he gave himself up to the delights of a Coupe Marocaine, wondering what elixir it was which Percy's Greek cook had introduced into this exotic entremet. Mary and Hester, who both had memories of Pangbourne, were outside this political debate, discussing mutual friends. 'Old Mrs. Proctor,' Mary said, 'had been born in India, and told me she was a Buddhist, and was convinced that in her next incarnation she would be a Siamese cat.'—'I like old Mrs. Proctor,' Hester mused.—'I did too. Her choice of a Siamese cat accurately reflected her nature. She was a cat, but a Siamese cat!' And laughed.

But Percy was suffering another transformation. His face had cleared up. He was obviously once more in the clutches of some heroic emotion, it seemed to Mary. And at this moment he broke the silence between the two men, which must have lasted several minutes.

'What you said was a hard saying,' Percy told his brother-in-law. 'Just for a moment it was too much even for me.'