and sure. I don't see
why in the end we shouldn't be very big. There's difficulties but I'm
equal to them. We're still a bit soft in our bones, but they'll harden
all right.... I suppose, after all, I'm worth something like a million,
George, cleared up and settled. If I got out of things now. It's a great
time, George, a wonderful time!"...

I glanced through the twilight at his convexity and I must confess it
struck me that on the whole he wasn't particularly good value.

"We got our hands on things, George, us big people. We got to hang
together, George run the show. Join up with the old order like that
mill-wheel of Kipling's. (Finest thing he ever wrote, George; I jes'
been reading it again. Made me buy Lady Grove.) Well, we got to run
the country, George. It's ours. Make it a Scientific Organised Business
Enterprise. Put idees into it. 'Lectrify it. Run the Press. Run all
sorts of developments. All sorts of developments. I been talking to Lord
Boom. I been talking to all sorts of people. Great things. Progress. The
world on business lines. Only jes' beginning."...

He fell into a deep meditation.

He Zzzzed for a time and ceased.

"YES," he said at last in the tone of a man who has at last emerged with
ultimate solutions to the profoundest problems.

"What?" I said after a seemly pause.

My uncle hung fire for a moment and it seemed to me the fate of nations
trembled in the balance. Then he spoke as one who speaks from the very
bottom of his heart--and I think it was the very bottom of his heart.

"I'd jes' like to drop into the Eastry Arms, jes' when all those beggars
in the parlour are sittin' down to whist, Ruck and Marbel and all, and
give 'em ten minutes of my mind, George. Straight from the shoulder.
Jes' exactly what I think of them. It's a little thing, but I'd like to
do it jes' once before I die."...

He rested on that for some time Zzzz-ing.

Then he broke out at a new place in a tone of detached criticism.

"There's Boom," he reflected.

"It's a wonderful system this old British system, George. It's staid
and stable and yet it has a place for new men. We come up and take our
places. It's almost expected. We take a hand. That's where our Democracy
differs from America. Over there a man succeeds; all he gets is money.
Here there's a system open to every one--practically.... Chaps like
Boom--come from nowhere."

His voice ceased. I reflected upon the spirit of his words. Suddenly I
kicked