implicity of her thoughts. Ishmael could not
but think her the perfect wife for Cloom and the future of Cloom. She
would bring fresh, clear blood to the old stock, which showed signs of
falling on unhealth. For the first time in his thirty-odd years Nicky
was in contact with someone he admired more than himself, and the result
was excellent. His early discontent had settled into ambition--the
limited honest ambition of the country gentleman such as Ishmael would
most have wished to see in him. Canada and the war between them had
carried him far from the politics of his father--as far as Ishmael had
found himself from Boase long ago; and when a bye-election occurred in
the division he stood for it in the Unionist interests, and won, his
honours still thick upon him, even in that Radical locality. He was now
growing more and more to be master of Cloom, taking an interest in it
even during his inevitable absences in town, Ishmael falling into the
background; for his sixty years, though vigorous within him if he took
care of himself, made him suffer for any violent exertion.

He had slipped into the background--to all but Georgie. She kept pace
with him, although so much younger, because in him she saw her own
youth. Her children had grown up and away from her as children must, and
she clung to her husband as she had not been wont to do when the
practical affairs of a family had absorbed more of her attention.

Ishmael endeavoured to live up to the Parson's advice and keep fluid,
and his naturally mobile nature helped him in this. Where and when he
did fall short, as the inevitable prejudices of age in favour of the
ways it knows arose in him, he at least could see it and smile at
himself. But, following on the intense period of personal feeling he had
lived through while Nicky was at the war, had come the inevitable
reaction, and from that reaction, as far as the capacity for any
outstanding emotion went, he was too old to recover.

He had learned the lesson of life too well, saw the whole pattern with
too great clarity. This alone would have relegated him to the
background, for it is the frame of mind which, when it is temperamental
from the outset, makes the looker-on at life; while when it is attained
it creates the person to whom other people come for sympathy and help in
matters that seem to them enormously important, even while they appeal
to the wider view for better proportion.

He was in the background; but he