The sea in the bay flashed and glittered
in the long rays of the afternoon sunshine. The scene was
extraordinarily peaceful. Stephen Dartrey for the first few minutes
certainly justified his reputation for taciturnity. He leaned back in a
long wicker chair, his head resting upon his hand, his thoughtful eyes
fixed upon vacancy. No man in those days could have resembled less a
popular leader of the people. In appearance he was a typical
aristocrat, and his expression, notwithstanding his fine forehead and
thoughtful eyes, was marked with a certain simplicity which in his
younger days had lured many an inexperienced debater on to ridicule and
extinction. In an intensely curious age, Dartrey was still a man over
whose personality controversy raged fiercely. He was a poet, a dreamer,
a writer of elegant prose, an orator, an artist. And behind all these
things there was a flame in the man, a perfect passion for justice, for
seeing people in their right places, which had led him from the more
flowery ways into the world of politics. His enemies called him a
dilettante and a poseur.
Pages:
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106