ished and half at home, called down the stairs. And then Sir
William descended, old and frail now in the morning, shaken: still he
approached Aaron heartily, and asked him how he did, and how he had
spent his morning. The old man who had made a fortune: how he expected
homage: and how he got it! Homage, like most things, is just a
convention and a social trick. Aaron found himself paying homage, too,
to the old man who had made a fortune. But also, exacting a certain
deference in return, from the old man who had made a fortune. Getting
it, too. On what grounds? Youth, maybe. But mostly, scorn for fortunes
and fortune-making. Did he scorn fortunes and fortune-making? Not he,
otherwise whence this homage for the old man with much money? Aaron,
like everybody else, was rather paralysed by a million sterling,
personified in one old man. Paralysed, fascinated, overcome. All those
three. Only having no final control over his own make-up, he could not
drive himself into the money-making or even into the money-having habit.
And he had just wit enough to threaten Sir William's golden king with
his own ivory queen and knights of wilful life. And Sir William quaked.

"Well, and how have you spent your morning?" asked the host.

"I went first to look at the garden."

"Ah, not much to see now. They have been beautiful with flowers,
once. But for two and a half years the house has been a hospital for
officers--and even tents in the park and garden--as many as two hundred
wounded and sick at a time. We are only just returning to civil life.
And flowers need time. Yes--yes--British officers--for two and a half
years. But did you go up, now, to the belvedere?"

"To the top--where the vines are? I never expected the mountains."

"You never expected the mountains? Pray, why not? They are always
there!"

"But I was never there before. I never knew they were there, round the
town. I didn't expect it like that."

"Ah! So you found our city impressive?"

"Very! Ah, very! A new world to me. I feel I've come out of myself."

"Yes, it is a wonderful sight--a wonderful sight-- But you have not been
INTO the town?"

"Yes. I saw the men being shaved, and all the soldiers at the station:
and a statue, and mountains behind it. Oh, I've had a full morning."

"A full morning! That is good, that is good!" The old man looked again
at the younger man, and seemed to get life from him, to live in him
vicariously.

"Come," said the hostess. "Lu