champagne set in an ice-pail--his waistcoat defended by a napkin, his
eyes rolling a little or glued in a stare on the waiter. Never did he
suffer his head or back to droop, for it was not distinguished so to do.

Because he was old and deaf, he spoke to no one; and no one spoke to
him. The club gossip, an Irishman, said to each newcomer: "Old Forsyte!
Look at 'um! Must ha' had something in his life to sour 'um!" But
Swithin had had nothing in his life to sour him.

For many days now he had lain in bed in a room exuding silver, crimson,
and electric light, smelling of opopanax and of cigars. The curtains
were drawn, the firelight gleamed; on a table by his bed were a jug of
barley-water and the Times. He made an attempt to read, failed, and fell
again to thinking. His face with its square chin, looked like a block
of pale leather bedded in the pillow. It was lonely! A woman in the
room would have made all the difference! Why had he never married? He
breathed hard, staring froglike at the ceiling; a memory had come into
his mind. It was a long time ago--forty odd years--but it seemed like
yesterday....

It happened when he was thirty-eight, for the first and only time in his
life travelling on the Continent, with his twin-brother James and a man
named Traquair. On the way from Germany to Venice, he had found himself
at the Hotel Goldene Alp at Salzburg. It was late August, and weather
for the gods: sunshine on the walls and the shadows of the vine-leaves,
and at night, the moonlight, and again on the walls the shadows of the
vine-leaves. Averse to the suggestions of other people, Swithin had
refused to visit the Citadel; he had spent the day alone in the window
of his bedroom, smoking a succession of cigars, and disparaging the
appearance of the passers-by. After dinner he was driven by boredom into
the streets. His chest puffed out like a pigeon's, and with something of
a pigeon's cold and inquiring eye, he strutted, annoyed at the frequency
of uniforms, which seemed to him both needless and offensive. His spleen
rose at this crowd of foreigners, who spoke an unintelligible language,
wore hair on their faces, and smoked bad tobacco. 'A queer lot!' he
thought. The sound of music from a cafe attracted him; he walked in,
vaguely moved by a wish for the distinction of adventure, without the
trouble which adventure usually brought with it; spurred too, perhaps,
by an after-dinner demon. The cafe was the bier-halle of the '