Percy Van Kristen arrived; and was brought into the secret chamber. Though only a little over thirty, he looked as old as Hadrian. The glowing freshness of his olive-skin had faded: but his superb eyes were as brightly expectant and his small round head as cleanly black as ever. He looked tired, but wholesome; and he was immaculately groomed. The Pope said a few words of greeting and of remembrance; and asked him to speak of himself. Van Kristen was shy: but not unwilling. Leading questions elicited that he was one of that pitiable class of men for whom the gods have provided everything but a career. Majority had brought him three-quarters of a million sterling. There was no necessity for him to go into commerce. Politics were impossible for respectable persons. He was too old for the services. The fact was, he had not the natural energy which would have hewn out a career--a career in the worldly sense--for himself; and by consequence, the world had shoved him aside on to the shelf of objects whose functions are purely decorative. His mode of life was that of a man of fashion, simple, exquisite. Perhaps he read a great deal; and, of course, his home took up most of his time--but that was a secret. Hadrian deftly extracted from him that he had founded and was maintaining a home for a hundred boys of his city, where he provided a complete training in electrical engineering and a fair start in life. His splendid eyes glittered as he spoke of this. It seemed that he had kept his own world in entire ignorance of his ardent effort to be useful; and one naturally enjoys talking of one's own affairs when the proper listener at last is encountered. No: he never had felt inclined to marry and rear a family of his own. He did not think that that sort of thing was much in his line. Yes: after leaving Oxford, he had had some thoughts of the priesthood. But Archbishop Corrie had laughed him out of that. He was not clever enough for the priesthood. That was the real truth, in his private opinion. Oh yes, he would like it very well,--as much as anything: but really he hardly felt himself equal to it. He didn't want to seem to push himself forward in any way. Yes: the Dynam House could get on quite well without him. They were fortunate in having a capable manager whom every one liked; and his own share didn't amount to much more than playing fives with the boys, and paying the bills, and finding out and getting all the latest dodges. If he could run over and look round the place, say twice a year, say two months in the year, he was quite willing to take up his abode with Hadrian, if His Holiness really wanted him. As a cardinal-deacon? Oh, that would be a daisy! But--sorry: he never did understand chaff. Hadrian was serious. Van Kristen's grand virginal eyes attentively considered the Pontiff. Then, with that strangely courtly gracious manner which was his natural gift, (and due to the perfect proportion of his skeleton), contrasting