indenting the rounded back of the moon; and it seemed to me that
Jervaise-Clump was the solid permanent thing; the moon a mere incident of
the night.

"Oh! Lord! Lord! What bosh it all is!" I exclaimed.

"All what?" Jervaise asked sharply.

"This business of distinctions; of masters and servants; of families in
possession and families in dependence," I enunciated.

"It isn't such dangerous bosh as socialism," Jervaise replied.

"I wasn't thinking of socialism," I said; "I was thinking of
interplanetary space."

Jervaise blew contemptuously. "Don't talk rot," he said, and I realised
that we were back again on the old footing of our normal relations.
Nevertheless I made one more effort.

"It isn't rot," I said. "If it is, then every impulse towards beauty and
freedom is rot, too." (I could not have said that to Jervaise in a house,
but I drew confidence from the last tip of the moon beckoning farewell
above the curve of the hill.) "Your, whatever it is you feel for Miss
Banks--things like that ... all our little efforts to get away from these
awful, clogging human rules."

I had given him his opportunity and he took it. He was absolutely
ruthless. "No one but a fool tries to be superhuman," he said. "Come on!"