t means life or death to
your aunt and some of the others, and it means a certain breaking up of
all this place. And it probably means the triumph of a charlatan like
Thurston and the increase of humbug in the world and the discouragement
of all the honest adventurers. I call myself an adventurer, you know,
Miss Maggie, although I'm a poor specimen--but I'm damned if it isn't
better to be a poor adventurer than to be a fat, swollen, contented
stay-at-home who can see just as far as his nose and his cheque-book
and might be just as well dead as alive--I beg your pardon," he added
suddenly, "for swearing--I'm not myself, I'm not really."

She could see indeed that he was in great agitation of mind, and some
of this agitation communicated itself to her. Had she not been selfish
in forgetting all this through her own happiness? He was right, she was
part of it all, whether she wished or no.

"What do you think," she asked, dropping her voice a little, "is the
real truth about it?"

"The real truth"--he looked at her suddenly with a tender, most
charming smile that took away his ugliness. "Ah, that's a tremendous
question. Part of the truth is that Warlock's been praying so much and
eating so little that it would be odd indeed if he didn't see visions
of some sort. And part of the truth is that there are a lot of women in
the world who'll believe simply anything that you tell them. It's part
of the truth, too, that there are scoundrels in the world who will take
advantage of anybody's simple trust to fill their pockets. But that's
not all," he went on, shaking his head, "no, that's not all. It's part
of the truth that there is a mystery, and that human beings will go on
searching whatever all the materialists and merchants in the world can
try to do to stop them. I remember years ago an old man, a little off
his dot, telling my father that he, the old man, was a treasure hunter.
He told my father that the world was divided into two halves, the
treasure hunters and the Town Councillors, and that the two halves
would never join and never even meet. My father, who was a practical
man, said that the old idiot should be shut up in an asylum, and
eventually I believe he was. 'We'll have him going off one day,' my
father said, 'in a cargo boat with a map in his pocket, looking for
gold pieces.' But it wasn't gold pieces he was after."

To Maggie it was always irritating the way that Mr. Magnus would wander
away from the subject