ite so much. They help to fight
against the flood of nasty realistic works we get nowadays. I should
like to see those all burnt."

Mrs. Blackstone went on to observe that she couldn't make out why
people went on writing such filth. She preferred books of a sound,
moral tone.

Morgan, feeling himself called upon to make common cause against the
Philistine, put in a tentative word of defence.

"That's true," admitted Mrs. Blackstone.

He soon drew further admissions from her, she never suspecting the
extent of the ground she was yielding till, just at the moment of
rising, she apparently gave up her whole position with the naive
statement:

"I always thought they had a reason for introducing that sort of
thing. Thank you so much, Mr. Druce, for explaining it to me."

He was not quite sure whether he had been bored or amused. All the
same he now felt glad he had come; he seemed to be so much more
actively interested in what was to follow. Instinctively he looked at
Ingram, and the novelist came to talk to him whilst the other men
discussed the hygienic aspects of smoking.

"Well, have you got over your temper yet?"

The phrasing was unfortunate, though its conciliatory intention was
obvious. Morgan felt he was being addressed as if he were a sulky
child, and his resentment leapt up afresh.

"I beg you will not interest yourself further in me," he said.

"Suppose we omit some of the conversation," suggested Ingram, "and
assume all that sort of thing to have been said. You are hurt because
I showed your letter to a friend. Aren't you taking a distorted view
of the matter? Recollect that at the time you were an utter stranger,
and your letter was a bolt from the blue. I cannot see that I
committed so very great a crime."

"It is as great or as little as you feel it to be."

"And how may it be purged?" asked Ingram ironically.

"Ponder over it till you perceive its enormity, then apologize to me
in the presence of the woman."

Morgan scarcely realised what he was saying till the words were out.
Apparently he had spoken without hesitating and without thinking, but
he knew that his utterance was the result of all that had occupied his
mind for many days past. He felt now he was on the road towards the
realisation of that fantastic future, that poem in life that was to
take the place of the poetry in words he had abandoned.

Ingram gave him a strange, piercing look. Morgan had never before seen
in his face su