again, leaving the sound of footsteps. Fort jerked the bell. He
was shown into what seemed, to one coming out of that mist, to be a
brilliant, crowded room, though in truth there were but two lamps and
five people in it. They were sitting round the fire, talking, and paused
when he came in. When he had shaken hands with Pierson and been
introduced to "my daughter Gratian" and a man in khaki "my son-in-law
George Laird," to a tall thin-faced, foreign-looking man in a black stock
and seemingly no collar, he went up to Noel, who had risen from a chair
before the fire. 'No!' he thought, 'I've dreamed it, or Leila has lied!'
She was so perfectly the self-possessed, dainty maiden he remembered.
Even the feel of her hand was the same-warm and confident; and sinking
into a chair, he said: "Please go on, and let me chip in."

"We were quarrelling about the Universe, Captain Fort," said the man in
khaki; "delighted to have your help. I was just saying that this
particular world has no particular importance, no more than a
newspaper-seller would accord to it if it were completely destroyed
tomorrow--''Orrible catastrophe, total destruction of the world--six
o'clock edition-pyper!' I say that it will become again the nebula out
of which it was formed, and by friction with other nebula re-form into a
fresh shape and so on ad infinitum--but I can't explain why. My wife
wonders if it exists at all except in the human mind--but she can't
explain what the human mind is. My father-in-law thinks that it is God's
hobby--but he can't explain who or what God is. Nollie is silent. And
Monsieur Lavendie hasn't yet told us what he thinks. What do you think,
monsieur?" The thin-faced, big-eyed man put up his hand to his high,
veined brow as if he had a headache, reddened, and began to speak in
French, which Fort followed with difficulty.

"For me the Universe is a limitless artist, monsieur, who from all time
and to all time is ever expressing himself in differing forms--always
trying to make a masterpiece, and generally failing. For me this world,
and all the worlds, are like ourselves, and the flowers and trees--little
separate works of art, more or less perfect, whose little lives run their
course, and are spilled or powdered back into this Creative Artist,
whence issue ever fresh attempts at art. I agree with Monsieur Laird, if
I understand him right; but I agree also with Madame Laird, if I
understand her. You see, I think min