ause he cares for physical adventure, just as you
do. Yes, you go motoring and shooting; he would like to go camping out.
Secondly, he cares for something special IN adventure. It is quickest to
call that special something poetry--"

"Oh, he's one of that writer sort."

"No--oh no! I mean he may be, but it would be loathsome stuff. His brain
is filled with the husks of books, culture--horrible; we want him to
wash out his brain and go to the real thing. We want to show him how
he may get upsides with life. As I said, either friends or the country,
some"--she hesitated--"either some very dear person or some very dear
place seems necessary to relieve life's daily grey, and to show that it
is grey. If possible, one should have both."

Some of her words ran past Mr. Wilcox. He let them run past. Others he
caught and criticised with admirable lucidity.

"Your mistake is this, and it is a very common mistake. This young
bounder has a life of his own. What right have you to conclude it is an
unsuccessful life, or, as you call it, 'grey'?"

"Because--"

"One minute. You know nothing about him. He probably has his own
joys and interests--wife, children, snug little home. That's where we
practical fellows" he smiled--"are more tolerant than you intellectuals.
We live and let live, and assume that things are jogging on fairly well
elsewhere, and that the ordinary plain man may be trusted to look after
his own affairs. I quite grant--I look at the faces of the clerks in my
own office, and observe them to be dull, but I don't know what's going
on beneath. So, by the way, with London. I have heard you rail against
London, Miss Schlegel, and it seems a funny thing to say but I was very
angry with you. What do you know about London? You only see civilisation
from the outside. I don't say in your case, but in too many cases that
attitude leads to morbidity, discontent, and Socialism."

She admitted the strength of his position, though it undermined
imagination. As he spoke, some outposts of poetry and perhaps of
sympathy fell ruining, and she retreated to what she called her "second
line"--to the special facts of the case.

"His wife is an old bore," she said simply. "He never came home last
Saturday night because he wanted to be alone, and she thought he was
with us."

"With YOU?"

"Yes." Evie tittered. "He hasn't got the cosy home that you assumed. He
needs outside interests."

"Naughty young man!" cried the girl.

"Na