vi

"And supposing myself to be the necromancer," said Monty, across the table, "how would you wish to consult me?"'

Patricia unfolded her napkin before answering, and looked round the dining room. The ceiling and walls were dim, because the room was lighted only by half-a-dozen candles set upon the table. The table itself had been made as small as possible, a perfect circle, and was not covered with a cloth. The candles within their decorated orange shades gave a mellow glow. She could see directly across the table to Monty, hardly three feet away, and soup was served the instant she was seated. Jacobs, having served the soup, retired from the room to await a summons.

"I should wish to consult you ... oh, upon a great number of things," evasively answered Patricia.

"As for instance?"

She smiled, looking quickly round, as if with a sinking heart.

"I don't strictly know what a necromancer is; but supposing him to be a seer of the future, I should like to know ... I should like to know...." Again Patricia hesitated. Hastily she improvised a substitute for the real problem in her mind. "Do you believe in anything at all?" she asked.

It was strange how tones, however low, were audible in that room. She could hear Monty's rich, caressing, magnetic voice, so soothingly quiet, as if it came from beside her.

"What would you like me to believe in?" he begged. "In Progress, or Faith, or the future of England and the Arts? In Beauty and Goodness? In yourself?"

"In honesty, for example. In truth."

"My dear Patricia, you shock me," protested Monty. "I have the greatest respect for truth, and of course for honesty."

"Have you any familiarity with either?" She could see that he would not talk seriously; and she presently was glad that he would not do so. She had wanted answers to other questions, and not to those she had put. The other questions it would have been impossible to ask.

"Patricia, I find that truth and honesty are supposed to be dull—so commonplace as to shock even those who seem to be unable to invent any satisfactory substitutes. 'Let us,' says the life-weary dweller in this district, 'let us read something and see something at the theatre which will take us away from the sordid truth of every-day life.' And yet, I have never seen truth. I believe I shouldn't know it if I saw it. 'What is truth?' asked jesting Pilate; and would not stay for an answer. He might have waited until the last trump. As for honesty, it's an appanage of truth, another romantic illusion. If you had asked me if I believed in Beauty, or Goodness, or in yourself, I should have said that the terms were indistinguishable."

"That would have been ample answer to my question about honesty," said Patricia. "I don't think I shall ask more questions of the necromancer. He seems to me rather specious." Nevertheless, Monty's elaborate reply to her false question had increased her composure. She was almost at ease, but still there was something to Monty not quite comprehensible in her ever so faintly agitated manner. "Won't you ... won't you tell me something about Carthage, please, or Egypt, or the Desert...." she asked.

"The desert," said Monty, musingly. "Yes, the desert...."