in the divorce court, he was at present defraying the
expenses of three households.

The sculptor had meanwhile seated himself at Reginald's writing-table,
unintentionally scanning a typewritten page that was lying before him.
Like all artists, something of a madman and something of a child, he at
first glanced over its contents distractedly, then with an interest so
intense that he was no longer aware of the impropriety of his action.

"By Jove!" he cried. "What is this?"

"It's an epic of the French Revolution," Reginald replied, not without
surprise.

"But, man, do you know that I have discovered my motive in it?"

"What do you mean?" asked Ernest, looking first at Reginald and then at
Walkham, whose sanity he began to doubt.

"Listen!"

And the sculptor read, trembling with emotion, a long passage whose
measured cadence delighted Ernest's ear, without, however, enlightening
his mind as to the purport of Walkham's cryptic remark.

Reginald said nothing, but the gleam in his eye showed that this time,
at least, his interest was alert.

Walkham saw the hopelessness of making clear his meaning without an
explanation.

"I forget you haven't a sculptor's mind. I am so constituted that, with
me, all impressions are immediately translated into the sense of form. I
do not hear music; I see it rise with domes and spires, with painted
windows and Arabesques. The scent of the rose is to me tangible. I can
almost feel it with my hand. So your prose suggested to me, by its
rhythmic flow, something which, at first indefinite, crystallised
finally into my lost conception of Narcissus."

"It is extraordinary," murmured Reginald. "I had not dreamed of it."

"So you do not think it rather fantastic?" remarked Ernest,
circumscribing his true meaning.

"No, it is quite possible. Perhaps his Narcissus was engaging the
sub-conscious strata of my mind while I was writing this passage. And
surely it would be strange if the undercurrents of our mind were not
reflected in our style."

"Do you mean, then, that a subtle psychologist ought to be able to read
beneath and between our lines, not only what we express, but also what
we leave unexpressed?"

"Undoubtedly."

"Even if, while we are writing, we are unconscious of our state of mind?
That would open a new field to psychology."

"Only to those that have the key, that can read the hidden symbols. It
is to me a matter-of-course that every mind-movement below or above the