e I looked back at his receding figure. His bearing had changed
remarkably, he seemed limp, shrunken. The contrast with his former
gesticulating, zuzzoing self took me in some absurd way as pathetic. I
watched him out of sight. Then wishing very heartily I had kept to my own
business, I returned to my bungalow and my play.

The next evening I saw nothing of him, nor the next. But he was very much
in my mind, and it had occurred to me that as a sentimental comic
character he might serve a useful purpose in the development of my plot.
The third day he called upon me.

For a time I was puzzled to think what had brought him. He made
indifferent conversation in the most formal way, then abruptly he came to
business. He wanted to buy me out of my bungalow.

"You see," he said, "I don't blame you in the least, but you've
destroyed a habit, and it disorganises my day. I've walked past here for
years--years. No doubt I've hummed.... You've made all that impossible!"

I suggested he might try some other direction.

"No. There is no other direction. This is the only one. I've inquired.
And now--every afternoon at four--I come to a dead wall."

"But, my dear sir, if the thing is so important to you--"

"It's vital. You see, I'm--I'm an investigator--I am engaged in a
scientific research. I live--" he paused and seemed to think. "Just over
there," he said, and pointed suddenly dangerously near my eye. "The house
with white chimneys you see just over the trees. And my circumstances are
abnormal--abnormal. I am on the point of completing one of the most
important--demonstrations--I can assure you one of the most important
demonstrations that have ever been made. It requires constant thought,
constant mental ease and activity. And the afternoon was my brightest
time!--effervescing with new ideas--new points of view."

"But why not come by still?"

"It would be all different. I should be self-conscious. I should think of
you at your play--watching me irritated--instead of thinking of my work.
No! I must have the bungalow."

I meditated. Naturally, I wanted to think the matter over thoroughly
before anything decisive was said. I was generally ready enough for
business in those days, and selling always attracted me; but in the first
place it was not my bungalow, and even if I sold it to him at a good price
I might get inconvenienced in the delivery of goods if the current owner
got wind of the transaction, and in the second I wa