k--of something that did not quite belong. Might it be,
perhaps, that sepia drawing--above the 'Tantalus' on the oak sideboard at
the far end--of a woman's face gazing out into the room? Mysteriously
unlike everything else, except the flowers, and this kitten that was
pushing its furry little head against his hand. Odd how a single thing
sometimes took possession of a room, however remote in spirit! It seemed
to reach like a shadow over Dromore's outstretched limbs, and weathered,
long-nosed face, behind his huge cigar; over the queer, solemn, chaffing
eyes, with something brooding in the depths of them.

"Ever get the hump? Bally awful, isn't it? It's getting old. We're
bally old, you know, Lenny!" Ah! No one had called him 'Lenny' for
twenty years. And it was true; they were unmentionably old.

"When a fellow begins to feel old, you know, it's time he went broke--or
something; doesn't bear sittin' down and lookin' at. Come out to 'Monte'
with me!"

'Monte!' That old wound, never quite healed, started throbbing at the
word, so that he could hardly speak his: "No, I don't care for 'Monte.'"

And, at once, he saw Dromore's eyes probing, questioning:

"You married?"

"Yes."

"Never thought of you as married!"

So Dromore did think of him. Queer! He never thought of Johnny Dromore.

"Winter's bally awful, when you're not huntin'. You've changed a lot;
should hardly have known you. Last time I saw you, you'd just come back
from Rome or somewhere. What's it like bein' a--a sculptor? Saw
something of yours once. Ever do things of horses?"

Yes; he had done a 'relief' of ponies only last year.

"You do women, too, I s'pose?"

"Not often."

The eyes goggled slightly. Quaint, that unholy interest! Just like
boys, the Johnny Dromores--would never grow up, no matter how life
treated them. If Dromore spoke out his soul, as he used to speak it out
at 'Bambury's,' he would say: 'You get a pull there; you have a bally
good time, I expect.' That was the way it took them; just a converse
manifestation of the very same feeling towards Art that the pious
Philistines had, with their deploring eyebrows and their 'peril to the
soul.' Babes all! Not a glimmering of what Art meant--of its effort,
and its yearnings!

"You make money at it?"

"Oh, yes."

Again that appreciative goggle, as who should say: 'Ho! there's more in
this than I thought!'

A long silence, then, in the dusk with the violet glim