of eyes lay the
spirituality that made her a mystery so sacred. He, great hulking
fellow, was a gross lump of clay. Ideals?

"I don't suppose I have any," said he.

"But you must. Everybody has, to a certain extent."

"Well, to ride straight and tell the truth--like the ancient Persians, I
suppose it was the Persians--anyway it's a sort of rough code I've got."

"Have you read Nietzsche?" she asked suddenly.

He frowned perplexedly. "Nietzsche--that's the mad superman chap, isn't
it? No. I've not read a word."

"I do wish you would. You'll find him so exhilarating. You might
possibly agree with a lot of what he says. I don't. But he sets you
thinking."

She sketched her somewhat prim conception of the Nietzschean philosophy,
and after listening to it in dumb wonder, he promised to carry out her
wishes. So, when I came down to my library that evening dressed for
dinner, I found him, still in morning clothes, with "Thus Spake
Zarathustra" on his knees, and a bewildered expression on his face.

"Have you read this, Hilary?" he asked.

"Yes," said I.

"Understand it?"

"More or less."

"Gosh!" said he, shutting the book, "and I suppose Doria understands it
too, or she wouldn't have recommended it. But," he rose ponderously and
looked down on me with serious eyes--"what the Hell is it all about?"

I drew out my watch. "The five seconds that you have before rushing
up-stairs to dress," said I, "don't give me adequate time to expound a
philosophic system."

Now if Adrian or I had talked to Jaffery about soul-progression and the
Will to Power and suggested that he was missing the essentials of life,
we should have been met with bellows of rude and profane derision. I
don't believe he had even roughly considered what kind of an
individuality he had, still less enquired into the state of his
spiritual being. But the flip of a girl he professed so much to despise
came along and reduced him to a condition of helpless introspection. I
cannot say that it lasted very long. Psychology and metaphysics and
aesthetics lay outside Jaffery's sphere. But while seeing no harm in his
own simple creed of straight-riding and truth-speaking, he added to it
an unshakable faith in Doria's intellectual and spiritual superiority.
On his first meeting with her he had disclaimed the subtler mental
qualities, videlicet his similitude of the bumble-bee; now, however, he
went further, declaring himself, to a subrident host, to be a
chuc