Prowling about from square to square, through deserted alleys, and by slumbering parks, he would feel the cumulative destinies of the millions of sleeping souls bearing on his consciousness. Solitude in a metropolis, unlike that of the country, which merely lulls or tends to the purifying of thought, intensifies the moods of a man like strong liquor. He who lives alone among millions courts all the mad fancies that his brain is heir to. Insanity, perversion, incoherent idealism, fanaticism--these are the offspring of unnatural detachment from one's fellows, and in turn give birth to the black moods of revolt against each and every thing that is. Living as he did in a sort of ecstasy by reason of his suddenly realised world-citizenship, Selwyn's incipient feeling of godlikeness developed still further under the spell of isolation. The fact that he trod the realm of thought, while all around him men and women grappled with the problems of war, only accentuated this condition of mind. He suffered--that was true. He missed the companionship of kindred spirits, and sometimes his memory would play truant, recalling the pleasant glitter of sterling silver and conversational electroplate which accompanied his former London dinner-parties. He did not dare to think of Elise at all. She was the intoxicating climax of his past life. She was the blending of his life's melodies into a brief, tender nocturne of love that his heart would never hear again. In place of all that, he had the spiritual vanity of martyrdom. Few voyagers but have felt the exultation of mid-ocean: that desire of the soul to leap the distance to the skies and claim its kinship to the stars. It comes to men on the Canadian prairies; it throbs in one's blood when the summit of a mountain is reached; it is borne on the wings of the twilight harmonies in a lonely forest. Unknown to himself, perhaps, that was Selwyn's compensation. From his hermit's seclusion in the great metropolis he felt the thrill of one who challenges the gods. II. His man-servant had hardly left the room when the bell in the front hall rang, and Smith reappeared to announce a visitor. 'Who is it?' asked Selwyn. 'A Mr. Watson, sir.' 'I wonder if it can be Doug Watson of Cambridge. Bring him right up.'