and late workers. The conductor ought to have
differentiated.... He put out a hand. The rain had capriciously ceased!
He departed gaily and triumphantly. He was re-endowed with the magical
invulnerability.

The background of his mind was variegated. The incidents of the
tremendous motor-car race from Paris to Berlin, which had finished
nearly a week earlier, still glowed on it. And the fact that King Edward
VII had driven in a car from Pall Mall to Windsor Castle in sixty
minutes was beautifully present. Then, he was slightly worried
concerning the Mediterranean Fleet. He knew nothing about it, but as a
good citizen he suspected in idle moments, like a number of other good
citizens, that all was not quite well with the Mediterranean Fleet. As
for the war, he had only begun to be interested in the war within the
last six months, and already he was sick of it. He knew that the Boers
had just wrecked a British military train, and his attitude towards such
methods of fighting was rather severe and scornful; he did not regard
them as 'war.' However, the apparent permanence of the war was
splendidly compensated by the victory of the brothers Doherty over the
American lawn-tennis champions in the Gentlemen's Doubles at Wimbledon.
Who could have expected the brothers to win after the defeat of R.H. by
Mr. Gore in the Singles? George had most painfully feared that the
Americans would conquer, and their overthrowing by the twin brothers
indicated to George, who took himself for a serious student of affairs,
that Britain was continuing to exist, and that the new national
self-depreciative, yearning for efficiency might possibly be rather
absurd after all.

In the midst of these and similar thoughts, and of innumerable minor
thoughts about himself, in the very centre of his mind and occupying
nearly the whole of it, was the vast thought, the obsession, of his own
potential power and its fulfilment. George's egotism was terrific, and
as right as any other natural phenomenon. He had to get on. Much money
was included in his scheme, but simply as a by-product. He had to be a
great architect, and--equally important--he had to be publicly
recognized as a great architect, and recognition could not come without
money. For him, the entire created universe was the means to his end. He
would not use it unlawfully, but he would use it. He was using it, as
well as he yet knew how, and with an independence that was as complete
as it was unco