resting
expressions. In his own opinion he was very beautiful, and he thought it
right to appreciate his own qualities of mind and of body. He hated
those fantastic creatures who are humble even in their self-communings,
cowards who dare not acknowledge even to themselves how exquisite, how
delicately fashioned they are. Quite frankly he told other people that
he was very wonderful, quite frankly he avowed it to himself. There is a
nobility in fearless truthfulness, is there not? and about the magic of
his personality he could never be induced to tell a lie.

It is so interesting to be wonderful, to be young, with pale gilt hair
and blue eyes, and a face in which the shadows of fleeting expressions
come and go, and a mouth like the mouth of Narcissus. It is so
interesting to oneself. Surely one's beauty, one's attractiveness,
should be one's own greatest delight. It is only the stupid, and those
who still cling to Exeter Hall as to a Rock of Ages, who are afraid, or
ashamed, to love themselves, and to express that love, if need be.
Reggie Hastings, at least, was not ashamed. The mantel-piece in his
sitting-room bore only photographs of himself, and he explained this
fact to inquirers by saying that he worshipped beauty. Reggie was very
frank. When he could not be witty, he often told the naked truth; and
truth, without any clothes on, frequently passes for epigram. It is
daring, and so it seems clever. Reggie was considered very clever by his
friends, but more clever by himself. He knew that he was great, and he
said so often in Society. And Society smiled and murmured that it was a
pose. Everything is a pose nowadays, especially genius.

This evening Reggie stood before the mirror till the Sevres clock on the
chimneypiece gently chimed seven. Then he drew out of their tissue paper
a pair of lavender gloves, and pressed the electric bell.

"Call me a hansom, Flynn," he said to his valet.

He threw a long buff-coloured overcoat across his arm, and went slowly
downstairs. A cab was at the door, and he entered it and told the man to
drive to Belgrave Square. As they turned the corner of Half Moon Street
into Piccadilly, he leant forward over the wooden apron and lazily
surveyed the crowd. Every second cab he passed contained an immaculate
man going out to dinner, sitting bolt upright, with a severe expression
of countenance, and surveying the world with steady eyes over an
unyielding rampart of starched collar. Reggie e