Lady Firmanence nodded the ribbons of her cap. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘he’s sadly too simple, and I wish--for I can’t help liking him--that he was as affected as some of those young upstarts who cultivate long hair and velvet coats on the strength of a slim volume printed on one side of the paper only. No--Lucian Damerel hasn’t a scrap of affectation about him, and he isn’t a _poseur_. I wish he were affected and that he would pose--I do indeed, for his own sake.’ Saxonstowe knew that his aunt was a clever woman. He held his tongue, asking her by his eyes to explain this desire of hers, which seemed so much at variance with her well-known love of humbug and cant. ‘Oh, of course I know you’re wondering at that!’ she said. ‘Well, the explanation is simple enough. I wish Lucian Damerel were a _poseur_, I wish he were affected, even to the insufferable stage, for the simple reason that if he were these things it would show that he was alive to the practical and business side of the matter. What is he? A writer. He’ll have to live by writing--at the rate he and Haidee live they’ll soon exhaust their resources--and he ought to be alive to the £ s. d. of his trade, for it is a trade. As things are, he isn’t alive. The difference between Lucian Damerel and some other men of equal eminence in his own craft is just this: they are for ever in an attitude, crying out, “Look at me--is it not wonderful that I am so clever?” Lucian, on the other hand, seems to suggest an attitude and air of “Wouldn’t it be curious if I weren’t?”’ ‘I think,’ said Saxonstowe, ‘that there may be some affectation in that.’ ‘Affectation,’ said Lady Firmanence, ‘depends upon two things if it is to be successful: the power to deceive cleverly, and the ability to deceive for ever. Lucian Damerel couldn’t deceive anybody--he’s a child, the child who believes the world to be an illimitable nursery crammed with inexhaustible toys.’ ‘You mean that he plays at life?’ ‘I mean that he plays _in_ life,’ said Lady Firmanence. ‘He’s still sporting on his mother’s breast, and he’ll go on sporting until somebody picks him up, smacks him soundly, and throws him into a corner. Then, of course, he will be vastly surprised to find that such treatment _could_ be meted out to him.’ ‘Then let us hope that he will be able to live in his world of dreams for ever,’ said Saxonstowe. ‘So he might, if the State were to establish an asylum for folk of his sort,’ said Lady Firmanence. ‘But he happens to be married, and married to Haidee Brinklow.’ ‘My publisher,’ remarked Saxonstowe, ‘gloated over the romantic circumstances of the marriage, and appeared to think that that sort of thing was good for trade--made books sell, you know.’ ‘I have no doubt that Damerel’s marriage made his books sell, and kept _Domitia_ running at the Athenæum for at least three months longer,’ replied Lady Firmanence. ‘Were the circumstances, then, so very romantic?’