"At first I could see nothing save that the chamber was large and lofty. Even at the moment it struck me--a sort of last attempt at superiority, you know--that it would be just like Captain Macedoine to live in a large and lofty chamber without much light. And then, as I saw him, propped up among cushions on an immense bed, with a table close at hand on which reposed writing materials, books, a photograph, and a small shaded lamp, I wondered why the characteristics which in him had created such animosity should take the form of an alluring hypnotism in his daughter. Such thoughts make one uneasy and anxious for one's position as a super in the play. For that was the upshot of it, that I was shakily anxious to see her again, to see Captain Macedoine because he was her father, to drift, I knew not where. I was a pretty spectacle to myself, I can assure you! "His illness had emaciated him, and the crimson bedspread, together with the long, drooping folds of the looped-up mosquito-bar, like the curtains of a catafalque, and a round cap he wore to cover his bald spot, gave him the air of some old pope holding an audience. He raised his eyes without lifting his head, and smiled as Madame Sarafov and her daughter, with measured strides that reminded one again of the larger carnivora, moved forward to the bedside. And he lifted his hand in a decidedly pontifical fashion, as though to bless them. I remained for a moment in the shadow before they turned and explained who I was; and the pale blue eyes, without any recognition, beamed upon me as upon a new and promising adherent to the faith. He was immensely improved, though very much nearer the grave than when I had seen him for that dubious moment through the window of his house in Ipsilon. The harsh ravages of a life of distorted ideals had been softened by illness to an ascetic benignity. And he talked. I was obliged to admit to myself that so far I had never seen him in private life. He talked and he was full of reminiscence. He had a musical tenor voice, and he spoke rapidly and with an unconcerned change from subject to subject which might be set down to garrulity. He gazed into the shadows as he talked and I listened, very much astonished. For it was not the talk of a wicked man or an unhappy man or even an unsuccessful man. It was rather the talk of an intelligent humbug, such as one might expect from the super-annuated and senile secretary of some rich and fantastic scientific society. He gave one that impression, that his whole life had been one of gentle dilletantism under the protecting shadow of giant vested interests. It was an astonishingly picturesque scene, the sort of _genre_ picture the Victorians did so well and for which we moderns have so profound a contempt. It might have been called 'The Old Professor Tells His Story.' It flowed from him. He had a fund of phrases, quite common no doubt, but which he used as though he had invented them himself. His long,