href="#u05b32c09-f729-4091-b0e9-86fef28c0d90">CHAPTER II--"Cherchez la Femme" CHAPTER III--One of the "Sufferers" CHAPTER IV--Debts of Honour CHAPTER V--Love versus Politics CHAPTER VI--The Conscience of a Statesman CHAPTER VII--A Blow for Borrowdean CHAPTER VIII--A Page from the Past CHAPTER IX--The Faltering of Mannering CHAPTER X--The End of a Dream CHAPTER XI--Borrowdean shows his "Hand" CHAPTER XII--Sir Leslie Borrowdean incurs a Heavy Debt CHAPTER XIII--The Woman and—the Other Woman
BOOK III
CHAPTER I--Matrimony and an Awkward Meeting CHAPTER II--The Snub for Borrowdean CHAPTER III--Clouds—and a Call to Arms CHAPTER IV--Disaster CHAPTER V--The Journalist Intervenes CHAPTER VI--Treachery and a Telegram CHAPTER VII--Mr. Mannering, M.P. CHAPTER VIII--Playing the Game CHAPTER IX--The Tragedy of a Key CHAPTER X--Blanche finds a Way Out
BOOK IV
CHAPTER I--The Persistency of Borrowdean CHAPTER II--Hester Thinks it "A Great Pity" CHAPTER III--Summoned to Windsor CHAPTER IV--Checkmate to Borrowdean CHAPTER V--A Brazen Proceeding E. Phillips Oppenheim's Novels
ILLUSTRATIONS
'I am very glad to know you, Mrs. Mannering.'
'I must have a few words with you before I go back,' he said, nonchalantly.
She leaned over him, one hand on the back of his chair.
Sir Leslie never quite forgot her gesture as she motioned him towards the door.
She was the only beautiful woman who sat alone and companionless.
'You will find yourself repaid for this, Sir Leslie,' she murmured.
Mannering rose to play his shot.
She was already on her way up the grey stone steps.
A LOST LEADER
BOOK I
CHAPTER I
RECONSTRUCTION
The two men stood upon the top of a bank bordering the rough road which led to the sea. They were listening to the lark, which had risen fluttering from their feet a moment or so ago, and was circling now above their heads. Mannering, with a quiet smile, pointed upwards.
"There, my friend!" he exclaimed. "You can listen now to arguments more eloquent than any which I could ever frame. That little creature is singing the true, uncorrupted song of life. He sings of the sunshine, the buoyant air; the pure and simple joy of existence is beating in his little heart. The things which lie behind the hills will never sadden him. His kingdom is here, and he is content."
Borrowdean's smile was a little cynical. He was essentially of that order of men who are dwellers in cities, and even the sting of the salt breeze blowing across the marshes—marshes riven everywhere with long arms of the sea—could bring no colour to his pale cheeks.
"Your little bird—a lark, I think you called it," he remarked, "may be a very eloquent prophet for the whole kingdom of his species, but the song of life for a bird and that for a man are surely different things!"
"Not so very different after all," Mannering answered, still watching the bird. "The longer one lives, the more clearly one recognizes the absolute universality of life."
Borrowdean shrugged his shoulders, with a little gesture of impatience. He had left London at a moment when he could ill be spared, and had not travelled to this out-of-the-way corner of the kingdom to exchange purposeless platitudes with a man whose present attitude towards life at any rate he heartily despised. He seated himself upon a half-broken rail, and lit a cigarette.
"Mannering," he said, "I did not come here to simper cheap philosophies with you like a couple of schoolgirls. I have a real live errand. I want to speak to you of great things."
Mannering moved a little uneasily. He had a very shrewd idea as to the nature of that errand.
"Of great things," he repeated slowly. "Are you in earnest, Borrowdean?"
"Why not?"
"Because," Mannering continued, "I have left the world of great things, as you and I used to regard them, very far behind. I am glad to see you here, of course, but I cannot think of any serious subject which it would be useful or profitable
