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Metaphor
Explanation and Analysis—Deep Waters:
Stevens recalls an uncomfortable conversation he had with the younger Mr. Cardinal, who was Darlington's godson but disagreed strongly with his political decisions. While Darlington facilitates a meeting between the German ambassador and English heads of state in the other room, Cardinal describes how he sees Darlington's situation with a metaphor.
His lordship is in deep waters. I’ve watched him swimming further and further out and let me tell you, I’m getting very anxious. He’s out of his depth, you see, Stevens.
"Out of his depth" is a common English-language idiom used to mean someone cannot handle the situation they're in. Here, however, Cardinal expands it into a metaphor. With his association with and promotion of the Germans, Darlington is "swimming further and further out," possibly much further than he can survive. It's not clear what Cardinal thinks will happen to Darlington if he gets lost in these "deep waters," but it won't be good. Although Stevens says he trusts Darlington's judgement, Cardinal tries again to convince him of the danger:
I remember this American chap, even drunker than I am now, he got up at the dinner table in front of the whole company. And he pointed at his lordship and called him an amateur. Called him a bungling amateur and said he was out of his depth. Well, I have to say, Stevens, that American chap was quite right.
Here Cardinal references Mr. Lewis, the American who tried to conspire against Darlington during the "unofficial conference" held at Darlington Hall to discuss an upcoming meeting about lessening the burden of the Treaty of Versailles. In Stevens's telling, Mr. Lewis was duplicitous, but Cardinal seems to think Lewis was correct—politics shouldn't be Darlington's realm, because he's a "bungling amateur" who does not have the skill level necessary to handle the sensitive situations he's in, just as a poor swimmer could fail to have the skill to return from the water they swam into.
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