us!"

"Yes."

But, as no words followed, Aldous turned. He saw his grandfather
standing erect before the fire, and was startled by the emotion he
instantly perceived in eye and mouth.

"You understand, Aldous, that for twenty years--it is twenty years last
month since your father died--you have been the blessing of my life? Oh!
don't say anything, my boy; I don't want any more agitation. I have
spoken strongly; it was hardly possible but that on such a matter I
should feel strongly. But don't go away misunderstanding me--don't
imagine for one instant that there is anything in the world that really
matters to me in comparison with your happiness and your future!"

The venerable old man wrung the hand he held, walked quickly to the
door, and shut it behind him.

* * * * *

An hour later, Aldous was writing in his own sitting-room, a room on the
first floor, at the western corner of the house, and commanding by
daylight the falling slopes of wood below the Court, and all the wide
expanses of the plain. To-night, too, the blinds were up, and the great
view drawn in black and pearl, streaked with white mists in the ground
hollows and overarched by a wide sky holding a haloed moon, lay spread
before the windows. On a clear night Aldous felt himself stifled by
blinds and curtains, and would often sit late, reading and writing, with
a lamp so screened that it threw light upon his book or paper, while not
interfering with the full range of his eye over the night-world without.
He secretly believed that human beings see far too little of the night,
and so lose a host of august or beautiful impressions, which might be
honestly theirs if they pleased, without borrowing or stealing from
anybody, poet or painter.

The room was lined with books, partly temporary visitors from the great
library downstairs, partly his old college books and prizes, and partly
representing small collections for special studies. Here were a large
number of volumes, blue books, and pamphlets, bearing on the condition
of agriculture and the rural poor in England and abroad; there were some
shelves devoted to general economics, and on a little table by the fire
lay the recent numbers of various economic journals, English and
foreign. Between the windows stood a small philosophical bookcase, the
volumes of it full of small reference slips, and marked from end to end;
and on the other side of the room was a revolving book-