angled--did
dangle when experimentally thrown--ludicrously futile in mid-air. The
thrower stepped back again to the artist's standpoint, and absorbed
impressions.

To give financial help came to assume an aspect of immorality. Loans
were gratefully taken, and no talk of repayment even remotely rose. It
was, as Warren had put it, 'very obvious'--so obvious as to be tiresome.
Illumination was shed on the aspect which the payment of debts presented
to the Crevequers on the night when they came to dinner, in their
redeemed dress-clothes, after winning on the lottery.

'And it all went,' Tommy concluded his narrative, stammering
querulously, 'to a silly fool we owed money to. Wasn't it a shame, Mrs.
Venables? We owed it him for months; he needn't have been in such a
tearing hurry all of a sudden. Waste, wasn't it? All kinds of things,
you know, we might have done with it. If we'd hired a motor-car, would
you all have come to Pompei with us? Or would you rather have taken a
boat to Capri? You could have had your choice, anyhow. And all that
money wasted; we might just as well have dropped it into the sea, you
know--better; it would have been fun diving for it and bringing it up
with our toes. Do you know how to do that, Venables? I did it once when
a North German Lloyd was going out. You know how they swim round and
dive for money and make such a horrid row? Well, I thought I'd do it,
too, once, because it was such a nice warm day; and they threw me
pennies, but another man always brought them up with his toes; I could
never find them. Sell, wasn't it? but much funnier than paying all that
money to Grollo. People are so grasping, aren't they.'

It was manifest that money lent to the Crevequers must be accounted a
bad debt. Mrs. Venables lent no more; her moral sense rebelled against
it.

But Warren proved himself admirably accommodating.

CHAPTER V

BAIAE'S BAY

'I woke before the morning, I was happy all the day.'
R. L. STEVENSON.

'Why should I care for the ages,
Because they are old and grey?
To me, like sudden laughter,
The stars are fresh and gay.
The world is a daring fancy,
And finished yesterday.'
G. K. CHESTERTON.

On a blue Sunday morning, not early enough to spoil their night--on
principle they shunned always the dimmer hours of dawn--the Crevequers
slipped the leash of the city and went to spend a happy day in the
country. They often spent their Sun