ctically nothing there, and
become an object of suspicion to the police; a country, as he said,
without a race of its own, without liberty, equality, or fraternity,
without principles, traditions, taste, without--in a word--a soul. He
had left it for his own good, and come to the only other country where he
could live well. June had dwelt unhappily on him in her lonely moments,
standing before his creations--frightening, but powerful and symbolic
once they had been explained! That he, haloed by bright hair like an
early Italian painting, and absorbed in his genius to the exclusion of
all else--the only sign of course by which real genius could be
told--should still be a "lame duck" agitated her warm heart almost to the
exclusion of Paul Post. And she had begun to take steps to clear her
Gallery, in order to fill it with Strumolowski masterpieces. She had at
once encountered trouble. Paul Post had kicked; Vospovitch had stung.
With all the emphasis of a genius which she did not as yet deny them,
they had demanded another six weeks at least of her Gallery. The
American stream, still flowing in, would soon be flowing out. The
American stream was their right, their only hope, their salvation--since
nobody in this "beastly" country cared for Art. June had yielded to the
demonstration. After all Boris would not mind their having the full
benefit of an American stream, which he himself so violently despised.

This evening she had put that to Boris with nobody else present, except
Hannah Hobdey, the mediaeval black-and-whitist, and Jimmy Portugal,
editor of the Neo-Artist. She had put it to him with that sudden
confidence which continual contact with the neo-artistic world had never
been able to dry up in her warm and generous nature. He had not broken
his Christ-like silence, however, for more than two minutes before she
began to move her blue eyes from side to side, as a cat moves its tail.
This--he said--was characteristic of England, the most selfish country in
the world; the country which sucked the blood of other countries;
destroyed the brains and hearts of Irishmen, Hindus, Egyptians, Boers,
and Burmese, all the best races in the world; bullying, hypocritical
England! This was what he had expected, coming to, such a country, where
the climate was all fog, and the people all tradesmen perfectly blind to
Art, and sunk in profiteering and the grossest materialism. Conscious
that Hannah Hobdey was murmuring, "H