Presently there was a shifting of chairs and Mr. Oriel set Mr. Carton beside Miss Sparling, saying that he knew they would have much in common. This introduction, besides making them form an immediate determination to show that they hadn’t, at the same time united them in a strong sense of ingratitude to Mr. Oriel who was happily engaged in parish talk with Mr. Belton. Their conversation therefore ran on such ordinary topics as why radio announcers had to pronounce Italian and other place-names in so original, and should they say uneducated a way, the rearranging of Harefield Park as a school, how uncomfortable one always felt while Mr. Churchill was away, the possible choice of a husband for the Heir to the Throne, how very kind the girl bus conductors and porters were, and why people in
