meant, and he who was proudly conscious of having succeeded thus,
could well afford to regard the lives of others as half-finished and
imperfect; he alone was at one with himself, his life alone was a
harmonious whole.

To Maurice Guest, all this mattered little or not at all; it was
merely the unavoidable introduction. The chief thing was that the old
man had known the world which Maurice so desired to know; he had seen
life, had lived much of his youth in foreign lands, and had the
conversation been skilfully set agoing in this direction, he would lay
a wrinkled hand on his listener's shoulder, and tell him of this
shadowy past, with short hoarse chuckles of pleasure and reminiscence,
which invariably ended in a cough. He painted it in vivid colours, and
with the unconscious heightening of effect that comes natural
to one who looks back upon a happy past, from which the countless
pricks and stings that make up reality have faded, leaving in their
place a sense of dreamy, unreal brightness, like that of sunset upon
distant hills. He told him of Germany, and the gay, careless years he
had spent there, working at his art, years of inspiriting,
untrammelled progress; told him of famous musicians he had seen and
known, of great theatre performances at which he had assisted, of
stirring PREMIERES, long since forgotten, of burning youthful
enthusiasms, of nights sleepless with holy excitement, and days of
fruitful, meditative idleness. Under the spell of these reminiscences,
he seemed to come into touch again with life, and his eyes lit with a
spark of the old fire. At moments, he forgot his companion altogether,
and gazed long and silently before him, nodding and smiling to himself
at the memories he had stirred up in his brain, memories of things
that had long ceased to be, of people who had long been quiet and
unassertive beneath their handful of earth, but for whom alone, the