Lacey is more intelligent and sympathetic than most persons, but the trait which distinguishes him chiefly from the mass of his fellows is his impulsive, generous helpfulness and his desire that you should share in any good secret. He simply cannot leave any house or any acquaintance quite as he finds them. He had not been in our sitting-room for five minutes the first time I invited him in, before he had noticed that we wanted new candle-shades. "You've got the wrong kind of holder too," he said. "You should get those heavy ones that slip down automatically as the candle burns. Give me a piece of paper and I'll let you have the address. And here's the address of a little woman who makes the most exquisite shades." It is characteristic of Lacey that he knows so many little women who want a helping hand. Always little women or devilish unlucky women. In fact, he is the best friend the unlucky ever had: they gravitate to him as by a natural law. He is the frankest man I ever met and certainly one of the most engaging. He has no reticences at all. His character is public property. And this without any swagger of disclosure, but naturally and simply. He says all that he feels and thinks at the same moment that he feels and thinks it: in fact, speech is a part of the feeling and the thought. Without this articulation both would be incomplete. But although so frank currently, he does not refer much to his past. His present occupation is secretary to one of the London Art clubs, and during their exhibitions he sits at a table and arranges for the sale of the few pictures which attract the few persons who can find money for such luxuries after having paid their chauffeur's bills. He always has a scheme for adding to his income. One day he has bought for a few shillings a grimy oil-painting which when cleaned and restored will fetch thousands. This morning he was all on fire to open a restaurant in a novel place, somewhere off Fleet Street or in the city itself. The novelty consists in limiting the food provided strictly to chops, hot, with hot buttered toast, and chops, cold, with salad. Nothing else at all, except drink. I don't see why the place should fail; but I feel sure that if it is started and made profitable Lacey will not be the chief receiver of the profits. "You see," he says, "my difficulty. I can't run a restaurant. I should hate it too much. What I want--what men like me want--is a decent financier to pay us for our ideas and for assisting in making them practicable, and then to let us go. But the worst of it is, that few things succeed unless the man who invented them goes through with it. But how could I? There's not only the horror of spending beautiful days among chops hot and chops cold, but I should pay everyone too much." "How did you come to think of it?" I asked.