for himself out of all the wealth streaming through his fingers neither
adulation nor love, neither splendour nor comfort. There was something
perfect in his consistent mediocrity. His very vanity seemed to miss the
gratification of even the mere show of power. In the days when he was
most fully in the public eye the invincible obscurity of his origins
clung to him like a shadowy garment. He had handled millions without
ever enjoying anything of what is counted as precious in the community of
men, because he had neither the brutality of temperament nor the fineness
of mind to make him desire them with the will power of a masterful
adventurer . . . "

"You seem to have studied the man," I observed.

"Studied," repeated Marlow thoughtfully. "No! Not studied. I had no
opportunities. You know that I saw him only on that one occasion I told
you of. But it may be that a glimpse and no more is the proper way of
seeing an individuality; and de Barral was that, in virtue of his very
deficiencies for they made of him something quite unlike one's
preconceived ideas. There were also very few materials accessible to a
man like me to form a judgment from. But in such a case I verify believe
that a little is as good as a feast--perhaps better. If one has a taste
for that kind of thing the merest starting-point becomes a coign of
vantage, and then by a series of logically deducted verisimilitudes one
arrives at truth--or very near the truth--as near as any circumstantial
evidence can do. I have not studied de Barral but that is how I
understand him so far as he could be understood through the din of the
crash; the wailing and gnashing of teeth, the newspaper contents bills,
"The Thrift Frauds. Cross-examination of the accused. Extra
special"--blazing fiercely; the charitable appeals for the victims, the
grave tones of the dailies rumbling with compassion as if they were the