othing about it. I don't see any use in making a
fuss!"

With that view Dartie at once concurred; looking upon James as a private
preserve, he disapproved of his being disturbed by the troubles of
others.

"Quite right," he said; "let Soames look after himself. He's jolly well
able to!"

Thus speaking, the Darties entered their habitat in Green Street, the
rent of which was paid by James, and sought a well-earned rest. The hour
was midnight, and no Forsytes remained abroad in the streets to spy out
Bosinney's wanderings; to see him return and stand against the rails of
the Square garden, back from the glow of the street lamp; to see him
stand there in the shadow of trees, watching the house where in the dark
was hidden she whom he would have given the world to see for a single
minute--she who was now to him the breath of the lime-trees, the meaning
of the light and the darkness, the very beating of his own heart.

CHAPTER X

DIAGNOSIS OF A FORSYTE

It is in the nature of a Forsyte to be ignorant that he is a Forsyte; but
young Jolyon was well aware of being one. He had not known it till after
the decisive step which had made him an outcast; since then the knowledge
had been with him continually. He felt it throughout his alliance,
throughout all his dealings with his second wife, who was emphatically
not a Forsyte.

He knew that if he had not possessed in great measure the eye for what he
wanted, the tenacity to hold on to it, the sense of the folly of wasting
that for which he had given so big a price--in other words, the 'sense of
property' he could never have retained her (perhaps never would have
desired to retain her) with him through all the financial troubles,
slights, and misconstructions of those fifteen years; never have induced
her to marry him on the death of his first wife; never have lived it all
through, and come up, as it were, thin, but smiling.

He was one of those men who, seated cross-legged like miniature Chinese
idols in the cages of their own hearts, are ever smiling at themselves a
doubting smile. Not that this smile, so intimate and eternal, interfered
with his actions, which, like his chin and his temperament, were quite a
peculiar blend of softness and determination.

He was conscious, too, of being a Forsyte in his work, that painting of
water-colours to which he devoted so much energy, always with an eye on
himself, as though he could not take so unpractical a pursuit q