that you
once edited a magazine yourself. You should have more respect for the
profession of letters."

"Don't argue," said Lalage. "All we say is that if you can't do anything
else you must be able to write."

Then the truth began to become clear to me. My dream of a life of
cultured ease, spent, with intervals for recreation, in the society of
gentle poets, faded.

"Do you mean," I said, "that I'm to----?"

"Certainly," said Lalage.

"To write a book?" I said desperately.

"That's the reason," said Lalage, "why I refurnished your study and
bought that perfectly sweet Dutch marquetry bureau and hung up the
picture of Milton dictating 'Paradise Lost' to his two daughters."

I have hated that picture since the day it first appeared in in my
study. I only agreed to letting it in because I knew the alternative was
Titherington's hospital nurse. The Dutch bureau, if it is Dutch, is most
uncomfortable to write at. There was no use, however, wrangling about
details. I brought forward the one strong objection to the plan which
occurred to me at the moment.

"Has my uncle been consulted?" I asked. "From what I know of Thormanby
I should say he's not at all likely to agree to my spending my life in
writing poetry."

"His idea," said my mother, "is that you should bring out a
comprehensive work on the economic condition of Ireland in the twentieth
century."

"He thinks," Lalage added, "that when you do go into Parliament it will
be a great advantage to you to be a recognized authority on something,
even if it's only Irish economics."

I knew, of course, that I should have to give in to a certain extent
in the end; but I was not prepared to fall in with Thormanby's absurd
suggestion.

"Very well," I said, "I shall write a book. I shall write my
reminiscences."

"Reminiscences," said Lalage, "are rather rot as a rule."

"The bent of my genius," I said, "is entirely reminiscent."

Rather to my surprise Lalage accepted the reminiscences as a tolerable
substitute for the economic treatise. I suppose she did not really care
what I wrote so long as I wrote something.

"Very well," she said. "We'll give you six months."

I had, I am bound to say, a very pleasant and undisturbed life during
the six months allowed me by Lalage. I did my writing, for the most
part, in the morning, working at the Dutch marquetry bureau from ten
o'clock until shortly after noon. I soon came to find a great deal of
pleasure in my work.