en. Have you ever in your life been in the smallest
doubt, even for a moment, about the way of honour, which it is?"

"That is all very well," I said; "I quite admit I do know that. I
generally do the other thing, but I know what I ought to do according to
the ridiculous standard of my class. But I don't know what you ought to
do. That's a different thing altogether."

"Because I am not of your class? not a gentleman?"

"Don't talk nonsense," I said. "There aren't any gentlemen left. The
species is extinct. The very name of it is vulgarised. You're as
near being one as anybody I know. And that has nothing to do with it.
Gentleman or not, you've go to decide for yourself. No man living can do
it for you."

"Your class would decide for me if I belonged to it," said Ascher. "The
collective wisdom of your class, the class instinct. It would make me
certain, leave me in no doubt at all, if only I belonged to it, were one
of you. The choice I have to make----"

Ascher paused.

"It's a nasty choice to have to make. You've got to be disloyal either
way you go. That's what it comes to."

"There is no other way," said Ascher sadly, "no third way."

"Not that I can see."

There was, in fact, a third way, though I did not see it at the time.
Mrs. Ascher discovered it. I heard of it two days later.

CHAPTER XVIII.

No one has greater respect and admiration for Ascher than I have.
I respect his ability. I admire his cool detachment of mind and his
unfailing feeling for justice. I recognise in him a magnanimity, a
certain knightliness which is very rare. But it is vain to pretend
that I can ever regard Ascher as an intimate friend. I am never quite
comfortable in his company. He lacks something, something essential. He
lacks a sense of humour.

No one in England--no one I suppose in Europe--wanted to make jokes
during that critical week which followed my interview with Ascher. The
most abandoned buffoon shrank from jesting when every morning brought a
fresh declaration of war by one great power on another. But even under
such circumstances the sense of the ridiculous survives--a thing to be
carefully concealed--in those who are fortunate enough to possess it
Ascher has no sense of the ridiculous. He sees men and women clad in
long, stately robes moving through life with grave dignity like Arab
chiefs or caliphs of Bagdad. He sees their actions conditioned and to
some extent controlled by the influences of majestic