; and Harding and Thompson and others of various temperaments
and talents found their way to Pump Court. Like cuckoos, some men are
only really at home in the homes of others; others are always ill at
ease when taken out of the surroundings which they have composed to
their ideas and requirements; and John Norton was never really John
Norton except when, wrapped in his long dressing-gown and sitting in
his high canonical chair, he listened to Harding's paradoxes or
Thompson's sententious utterances. These artistic discussions--when
in the passion of the moment, all the cares of life were lost and
the soul battled in pure idea--were full of attraction and charm
for John, and he often thought he had never been so happy. And then
Harding's eyes would brighten, and his intelligence, eager as a wolf
prowling for food, ran to and fro, seeking and sniffing in all John's
interests and enthusiasms. He was at once fascinated by the scheme
for the pessimistic poem and charmed with the projected voyage in
Thibet and the book on the Great Lamas.

One evening a discussion arose as to whether Goethe had stolen from
Schopenhauer, or Schopenhauer from Goethe, the comparison of man's
life with the sun "which seems to set to our earthly eyes, but which
in reality never sets, but shines on unceasingly." The conversation
came to a pause, and then Harding said--

"Mike spoke to me of a pessimistic poem he has in mind; did he ever
speak to you about it, Escott?"

"I think he said something once, but he did not tell me what it was
about. He can speak of nothing now but a nun whom he has persuaded
to leave her convent. I had thought of having some articles written
about convents, and we went to Roehampton. While I was talking to my
cousin, who is at school there, he got into conversation with one of
the sisters. I don't know how he managed it, but he has persuaded her
to leave the convent, and she is coming to see him to-morrow."

"You don't mean to say," cried John, "that he has persuaded one of
the nuns to leave the convent and to come and see him in Temple
Gardens? Such things should not be permitted. The Reverend Mother or
some one is in fault. That man has been the ruin of hundreds, if not
in fact, in thought. He brings an atmosphere of sensuality wherever
he goes, and all must breathe it; even the most virtuous are
contaminated. I have felt the pollution myself. If the woman is
seventy she will look pleased and coquette if he notices