he said peevishly. And when
they returned to Sawston through the Virgilian counties, she disliked
him looking out of the windows, for all the world as if Nature was some
dangerous woman.

He resumed his duties with a feeling that he had never left them. Again
he confronted the assembled house. This term was again the term; school
still the world in miniature. The music of the four-part fugue entered
into him more deeply, and he began to hum its little phrases. The same
routine, the same diplomacies, the same old sense of only half knowing
boys or men--he returned to it all: and all that changed was the cloud
of unreality, which ever brooded a little more densely than before. He
spoke to his wife about this, he spoke to her about everything, and she
was alarmed, and wanted him to see a doctor. But he explained that it
was nothing of any practical importance, nothing that interfered with
his work or his appetite, nothing more than a feeling that the cow was
not really there. She laughed, and "how is the cow today?" soon passed
into a domestic joke.

XX

Ansell was in his favourite haunt--the reading-room of the British
Museum. In that book-encircled space he always could find peace. He
loved to see the volumes rising tier above tier into the misty dome. He
loved the chairs that glide so noiselessly, and the radiating desks,
and the central area, where the catalogue shelves curve, round the
superintendent's throne. There he knew that his life was not ignoble. It
was worth while to grow old and dusty seeking for truth though truth is
unattainable, restating questions that have been stated at the beginning
of the world. Failure would await him, but not disillusionment. It was
worth while reading books, and writing a book or two which few would
read, and no one, perhaps, endorse. He was not a hero, and he knew it.
His father and sister, by their steady goodness, had made this life
possible. But, all the same, it was not the life of a spoilt child.

In the next chair to him sat Widdrington, engaged in his historical
research. His desk was edged with enormous volumes, and every few
moments an assistant brought him more. They rose like a wall against
Ansell. Towards the end of the morning a gap was made, and through it
they held the following conversation.

"I've been stopping with my cousin at Sawston."

"M'm."

"It was quite exciting. The air rang with battle. About two-thirds of
the masters have lost their heads,