s with you. They thought
you were having a joke with them."

Dirk Stroeve took off his spectacles and wiped them. His
flushed face was shining with excitement.

"Why should you think that beauty, which is the most precious
thing in the world, lies like a stone on the beach for the
careless passer-by to pick up idly? Beauty is something
wonderful and strange that the artist fashions out of the
chaos of the world in the torment of his soul. And when he
has made it, it is not given to all to know it. To recognize
it you must repeat the adventure of the artist. It is a
melody that he sings to you, and to hear it again in your own
heart you want knowledge and sensitiveness and imagination."

"Why did I always think your pictures beautiful, Dirk?
I admired them the very first time I saw them."

Stroeve's lips trembled a little.

"Go to bed, my precious. I will walk a few steps with our
friend, and then I will come back."

Chapter XX

Dirk Stroeve agreed to fetch me on the following evening and
take me to the cafe at which Strickland was most likely to be found.
I was interested to learn that it was the same as that
at which Strickland and I had drunk absinthe when I had gone
over to Paris to see him. The fact that he had never changed
suggested a sluggishness of habit which seemed to me characteristic.

"There he is," said Stroeve, as we reached the cafe.

Though it was October, the evening was warm, and the tables on
the pavement were crowded. I ran my eyes over them, but did
not see Strickland.

"Look. Over there, in the corner. He's playing chess."

I noticed a man bending over a chess-board, but could see only
a large felt hat and a red beard. We threaded our way among
the tables till we came to him.

"Strickland."

He looked up.

"Hulloa, fatty. What do you want?"

"I've brought an old friend to see you."

Strickland gave me a glance, and evidently did not recognise me.
He resumed his scrutiny of the chess-board.

"Sit down, and don't make a noise," he said.

He moved a piece and straightway became absorbed in the game.
Poor Stroeve gave me a troubled look, but I was not
disconcerted by so little. I ordered something to drink,
and waited quietly till Strickland had finished. I welcomed the
opportunity to examine him at my ease. I certainly should
never have known him. In the first place his red beard,
ragged and untrimmed, hid much of his face, and his hair was long;
b