Yes, it's a perfect floor, isn't it? Like glass. . . . (_They go out, followed by their respective families. BELLE supports HENRIKA, who is still very weak after her shock._) BELLE. How exciting it was, wasn't it, Henrika? HENRIKA. Wasn't it awful--too awful! Oh, that face. . . . (_CAIN follows ASTON out in silence and dejection. SIR JASPER brings up the rear of the procession. His face wears its usual expression of slightly bored amusement. He lights a cigarette._) SIR JASPER. Charming evening, charming evening. . . . Now it's over, I wonder whether it ever existed. (_He goes out. The conservatory is left empty. The flowers flash their luminous pistils; the eyes of the assafoetida blossoms solemnly wink; leaves shake and sway and rustle; several of the flowers are heard to utter a low chuckle, while the Alocusia, after whistling a few derisive notes, finally utters a loud, gross Oriental hiccough._) THE CURTAIN SLOWLY DESCENDS. CYNTHIA WHEN, some fifty years hence, my grandchildren ask me what I did when I was at Oxford in the remote days towards the beginning of our monstrous century, I shall look back across the widening gulf of time and tell them with perfect good faith that I never worked less than eight hours a day, that I took a keen interest in Social Service, and that coffee was the strongest stimulant in which I indulged. And they will very justly say--but I hope I shall be out of hearing. That is why I propose to write my memoirs as soon as possible, before I have had time to forget, so that having the truth before me I shall never in time to come be able, consciously or unconsciously, to tell lies about myself. At present I have no time to write a complete account of that decisive period in my history. I must content myself therefore with describing a single incident of my undergraduate days. I have selected this one because it is curious and at the same time wholly characteristic of Oxford life before the war. My friend Lykeham was an Exhibitioner at Swellfoot College. He combined blood (he was immensely proud of his Anglo-Saxon descent and the derivation of his name from Old English _lycam_, a corpse) with brains. His tastes were eccentric, his habits deplorable, the range of his information immense. As he is now dead, I will say no more about his character. To proceed with my anecdote: I had gone one evening, as was my custom, to visit him in his rooms at Swellfoot. It was just after nine when I mounted the stairs, and great Tom was still tolling. "In Thomae laude Resono bim bam sine fraude,"