Page:Claire Ambler (1928).djvu/101

 the Bastoni are trying to keep the Fascisti from getting better organized here, and they think you're doing the organizing; Mr. Rennie told me. But I don't see why anything like that should make a personal feeling, as it does seem to do, between you and the baron and his brother. At home, in America, everybody's either a Republican or a Democrat, and of course they all vote against each other and call each other terrible names. But it doesn't really mean anything—they're just trying to get the farmers excited and fool the public. But even the ones that do the most of it against each other know it's all just a gorgeous bluff and they get together and joke about it. Why couldn't you do that here? It would be so much more comfortable; it seems to me you take things too seriously."

"Perhaps we do," he said; and he smiled, not finding any fault in her complete lack of comprehension. "It would not be easy to explain to a person from a country where everything is so comfortable. I am afraid we are worse than serious; for more than two thousand years we have even been passionate in our politics, and you see that makes it quite a habit."

"Then it seems to me time you got over it."

The young man was not displeased with her for her