VIII


Mrs. Chepstow had said to Nigel, "Bring Doctor Isaacson--if he'll come."
He had never gone, though Nigel had told him of her words, had told him
more than once. Without seeming deliberately to avoid the visit, he had
deliberately avoided it. He never had an hour to spare in the day, and
Nigel knew it. But he might have gone on a Sunday. It happened that, at
present, on Sundays he was always out of town.

He had said to himself, "_Cui bono?_"

He had the sensitive nature's dislike of mingling intimately in the
affairs of others, and moreover he felt instinctively that if he tried
to play a true friend's part to Nigel, he might lose Nigel as a friend.
His clear insight would be antagonistic to Nigel's blind enthusiasm,
his calm worldly knowledge would seem only frigid cruelty to Nigel's
generosity and eagerness in pity. And, besides, Isaacson had a strong
personal repulsion from Mrs. Chepstow, a repulsion almost physical.

The part of him that was Jewish understood the part of her that was
greedy far too well. And he disliked, while he secretly acknowledged,
his own Jewishness. He seldom showed this dislike, even subtly, to the
world and never showed it crudely, as do many of Jewish blood, by a
strange and hideous anti-Semitism. But it was always alive within him,
always in conflict with something belonging to his nature's artistic