pretend scorn for it, I see that,' said
Heron.

'Not at all, my dear chap, not a bit of it. Indeed, I should be one of
the last to scorn that particular aim. But I was wondering if you
cherished any other. A "way out." Yes, there's something rather
heart-stirring about the thought. I wonder if there is such a thing as a
"way out." I forget the name of the Roman gentleman who hankered after
a "way out." Once in a year or so he used to wake up, full of the
conviction that he'd found it. Out came the family chariots, and off
he would gallop across the Campagna to the hills beyond, where, no
doubt, he had a villa of sorts, vineyards, and the rest of it. Here,
in chaste seclusion, was his "way out": a glorious relief, the
beginning of the great peace. And, a few weeks later, Rome would see
his chariots dashing back again into the city, even harder driven than
on the passage out. However, I suppose there is a "way out" somewhere
for every one.'

'Well, I wouldn't say for every one,' said Heron thoughtfully. 'It
doesn't matter how fast you drive, you can't get away from yourself,
of course. The question of whether there is or is not a "way out"
depends on what you want to get away from, and where you want to
reach.'

It may be well enough to say with the poet: 'What so wild as words
are?' But the fact remains that mere words, and the grouping of words,
apart from their normal, everyday significance, have a notable
influence upon the thoughts of some folk, and especially, I suppose,
of writers. I know that Heron's careless 'way out' phrase occupied my
mind greatly for many weeks after it was spoken.

'After all,' I sometimes asked myself, 'what has my whole life
amounted to but an uneasy, restless, striving search for a "way out"?
It has never been "to-day" with me, but always "to-morrow"; and the
morrow has never come. Never for a moment have I thought: "This thing
in my hand is what I want; this present Here and Now is what I desire.
I will retain this, and so shall be content." No, my strivings--and I
have been always striving--have been for something the future was to
bring. And, behold, what was the future is more barren than the past;
it is that thing which I seem incapable of valuing--the present. Is
there a "way out" for me? Surely there must be. I certainly am no more
fastidious than my neighbours, and indeed am much simpler in my tastes
than most of them.'

And that was true. If I could lay claim to no other ki