‘Oh, normal people! they’re the whole trouble. They don’t _think_. They don’t see that you can’t miss anything of which you’ve never been conscious. All the things for which they value life--their food, their loves and lusts and little schemes and athletic exercises, all the little excitements--what are they but a desperate questioning: ‘What shall I do to be happy, to fill up the emptiness, leaven the dreariness? How can I best cheat myself and God?’ And, strange to say, they don’t think what a lot of trouble would have been saved if they’d never been--never had to go hunting for their pleasures or flying from their pains. A trivial agitation that should never have begun; and back into nothing again. How silly!... As you may have guessed, I am not altogether convinced of the One Increasing Purpose. I have the misfortune to be doubtful of the objective value of life, and especially of its pains. Neither do my own griefs either interest or purify me. So you see----’ He turned from the window and smiled at her. ‘Yet even I have my compensations: music, food, beautiful people, conversation--or should I say monologue?--especially this sort of bogus philosophy to which you have been so patiently listening. Do you agree with me, by the way?’ ‘No. Do you?’ He laughed and shrugged. ‘Still,’ she added, ‘it’s a point of view. I’ll think about it. I can’t think quickly. But oh!----’ She stopped. ‘What?’ ‘I’m so thankful I’ve been born.’ She blushed. ‘Even if I _knew_ you were right I wouldn’t feel it.’ ‘Ah, you’ve never bored yourself. Perhaps you never will. I hope and believe it’s unlikely.’ She looked at him with distress. Poor Julian! He had to be theatrical, but his unhappiness was sincere enough. His jesting was so humourless, so affected that it crushed the spirit; and all his talking seemed less a normal exercise than a forced hysterical activity assumed to ease sharp wretchedness. It was not fair to judge and dislike him: he was a sick man. He sat down again at the piano, and she rose on an impulse and went and stood beside him. ‘Some chaps dance,’ he said. ‘They haven’t stopped dancing since they’ve been back. I play----’ He plunged into a medley of ragtime--‘and play--and play--and play. Syncopation--gets you--right on the nerves--like cocaine--No wonder it’s popular.’ ‘Do you like it?’ ‘Intellectually,’ he said, ‘I adore it. It’s _so_ clever.’ He played on loudly, rapidly, with pyrotechnical brilliance, then stopped. ‘My passions, however, are too debile to be stirred.’ He flung round on the piano stool and dropped his face into his hands, rubbing his eyes wearily. ‘Julian--I wish you weren’t--I wish you could----’ He looked up, startled, saw her expression, looked quickly away again and gave an embarrassed laugh like a boy. ‘It’s all right,’ he said, ‘You needn’t take any notice of me. I’m being a bore. I’m sorry.’ The last words were faintly husky. ‘Oh, you’re _not_ a bore, you’re not! Only--_don’t_ be so miserable.’