"Why your books are not so bad as that," said Paul, fairly laughing and
feeling that if ever a fellow had breathed the air of art--!

"So bad as what?"

"Your talent's so great that it's in everything you do, in what's less
good as well as in what's best. You've some forty volumes to show for
it--forty volumes of wonderful life, of rare observation, of magnificent
ability."

"I'm very clever, of course I know that"--but it was a thing, in fine,
this author made nothing of. "Lord, what rot they'd all be if I hadn't
been I'm a successful charlatan," he went on--"I've been able to pass off
my system. But do you know what it is? It's cartonpierre."

"Carton-pierre?" Paul was struck, and gaped.

"Lincrusta-Walton!"

"Ah don't say such things--you make me bleed!" the younger man protested.
"I see you in a beautiful fortunate home, living in comfort and honour."

"Do you call it honour?"--his host took him up with an intonation that
often comes back to him. "That's what I want _you_ to go in for. I mean
the real thing. This is brummagem."

"Brummagem?" Paul ejaculated while his eyes wandered, by a movement
natural at the moment, over the luxurious room.