Richard, curled narrow in his chair like a snake, glanced up at the big man projecting over him. A sort of magnetic effusion seemed to come out of Kangaroo’s body, and Richard’s hand was almost drawn in spite of himself to touch the other man’s body. He had deliberately to refrain from laying his hand on the near, generous stomach of the Kangaroo, because automatically his hand would have lifted and sought that rest. But he prevented himself, and the eyes of the two men met. Kangaroo searched Lovat’s eyes: but they seemed to be of cloudy blue like hell-smoke, impenetrable and devilish. Kangaroo watched a long time: but the other man was the unchangeable. Kangaroo turned aside suddenly. “Ah well,” he said. “I can see there is a beast in the way. There is a beast in your eyes, Lovat, and if I can’t conquer him then--then woe-betide you, my dear. But I love you, you see.” “Sounds like a threat,” laughed Somers. Kangaroo leaned and laid his hand gently on Lovat’s shoulder. “Don’t say that”; his voice was small now, and very gentle. “I loved you before I knew you. My soul cries for you. And you hurt me with the demon that is in you.” Richard became very pale, and was silent for some moments. The hand sank heavier, nearer, on his shoulder. “You see,” said Somers, trying hard to be fair, “what you call my demon is what I identify myself with. It’s my best me, and I stick to it. I think love, all this love of ours, is a devilish thing now: a slow poison. Really, I know the dark god at the lower threshold--even if I have to repeat it like a phrase. And in the sacred dark men meet and touch, and it is a great communion. But it isn’t this love. There’s no love in it. But something deeper. Love seems to me somehow trivial: and the spirit seems like something that belongs to paper. I can’t help it--I know another God.” The pressure of the hand became inert. “But aren’t you merely inventing other terms for the same thing that I mean, and that I call love?” said Kangaroo, in a strange, toneless voice, looking aside. “Does it seem to you that I am?” asked Lovat, gently and dispassionately. The strange, great passionate cloud of Kangaroo still hung there, hovering over the pale, sharp isolation of Somers, who lay looking up. And then it seemed as if the glow and vibration left Kangaroo’s body, the cloud became grey and heavy. He sighed, removed his hand, and turned away. “Ah well!” he said. “Ah well!” Somers rose, trembling now, and feeling frail. “I’ll go,” he said. “Yes, do go,” said Kangaroo. And without another word Somers went, leaving the other man sunk in a great heap in his chair, as if defeated. Somers did not even pity him. His heart felt queer and cave-like and devoid of emotion.