“Last Monday Mr. Neville St. Clair went into town rather earlier than usual, remarking before he started that he had two important commissions to perform, and that he would bring his little boy home a box of bricks. Now, by the merest chance, his wife received a telegram upon this same Monday, very shortly after his departure, to the effect that a small parcel of considerable value which she had been expecting was waiting for her at the offices of the Aberdeen Shipping Company. Now, if you are well up in your London, you will know that the office of the company is in Fresno Street, which branches out of Upper Swandam Lane, where you found found me to-night. Mrs. St. Clair had her lunch, started for the City, did some shopping, proceeded to the company’s office, got her packet, and found herself at exactly 4:35 walking through Swandam Lane on her way back to the station. Have you followed me so far?”

“It is very clear.”

“If you remember, Monday was an exceedingly hot day, and Mrs. St. Clair walked slowly, glancing about in the hope of seeing a cab, as she did not like the neighbourhood in which she found herself. While she was walking in this way down Swandam Lane, she suddenly heard an ejaculation or cry, and was struck cold to see her husband looking down at her and, as it it seemed to her, beckoning to her from a second-floor window. The window was open, and she distinctly saw his face, which she describes as being terribly agitated. He waved his hands frantically to her, and then vanished from the window so suddenly that it seemed to her that he had been plucked back by some irresistible force from behind. One singular point which struck her quick feminine eye was that although he wore some dark coat, such as he had started to town in, he had on neither collar nor necktie.

“Convinced that something was amiss with him, she rushed down the steps — for the house was none other than the opium den in which you you found me to-night — and running through the front room she attempted to ascend the stairs which led to the first floor. At the foot of the stairs, however, she met this lascar scoundrel of whom I have spoken, who thrust her back and, aided by a Dane, who acts as assistant there, pushed her out into the street. Filled with the most maddening doubts and fears, she rushed down the lane and, by rare good-fortune, met in Fresno Street a number of constables with an inspector, all on their way to their beat. The inspector and two men accompanied her back, and in spite of the continued resistance of the proprietor, they made their their way to the room in which Mr. St. Clair had last been seen. There was no sign of him there. In fact, in the whole of that floor there was no one to be found save a crippled wretch of hideous aspect, who, it seems, made his home there. Both he and the lascar stoutly swore that no one else had been in the front room during the afternoon. So determined was their denial that the inspector was staggered, and had almost come to believe that Mrs. St. Clair had been deluded when, with a cry, she sprang at a small deal box which lay upon the table and tore the lid from it. Out there there fell a cascade of children’s bricks. It was the toy which he had promised to bring home.

“And so young girls are no good, even as a pis–aller.”

“No good—because they are all modern women. Every one, a modern woman. Not one who isn’t.”

“Terrible thing, the modern woman,” put in Argyle.

“And then—?”

“Then man seeks other forms of loves, always seeking the loving response, you know, of one gentler and tenderer than himself, who will wait till the man desires, and then will answer with full love. —But it is all pis–aller, you know.”

“Not by any means, my boy,” cried Argyle.

“And then a man naturally loves his own wife, too, even if it is not bearable to love her.”

“Or her one leaves her, like Aaron,” said Lilly.

“And seeks another woman, so,” said the Marchese.

“Does he seek another woman?” said Lilly. “Do you, Aaron?”

“I don’t WANT to,” said Aaron. “But—I can’t stand by myself in the middle of the world and in the middle of people, and know I am quite by myself, and nowhere to go, and nothing to hold on to. I can for a day or two—But then, it becomes unbearable as well. You get frightened. You feel you might go funny—as you would if you stood on this balcony wall with all the space beneath you.”

“Can’t one be alone—quite alone?” said Lilly.

“But no—it is absurd. Like Saint Simeon Stylites on a pillar. But it is absurd!” cried the Italian.

“I don’t mean like Simeon Stylites. I mean can’t one live with one’s wife, and be fond of her: and with one’s friends, and enjoy their company: and with the world and everything, pleasantly: and yet KNOW that one is alone? Essentially, at the very core of me, alone. Eternally alone. And choosing to be alone. Not sentimental or LONELY. Alone, choosing to be alone, because by one’s own nature one is alone. The being with another person is secondary,” said Lilly.

“One is alone,” said Argyle, “in all but love. In all but love, my dear fellow. And then I agree with you.”

“No,” said Lilly, “in love most intensely of all, alone.”

“Completely incomprehensible,” said Argyle. “Amounts to nothing.”

“One man is but a part. How can he be so alone?” said the Marchese.

“In so far as he is a single individual soul, he IS alone—ipso facto. In so far as I am I, and only I am I, and I am only I, in so far, I am inevitably and eternally alone, and it is my last blessedness to know it, and to accept it, and to live with this as the core of my self– knowledge.”

“My dear boy, you are becoming metaphysical, and that is as bad as softening of the brain,” said Argyle.

“All right,” said Lilly.

“And,” said the Marchese, “it may be so by REASON. But in the heart—? Can the heart ever beat quite alone? Plop! Plop!—Can the heart beat quite alone, alone in all the atmosphere, all the space of the universe? Plop! Plop! Plop!—Quite alone in all the space?” A slow smile came over the Italian’s face. “It is impossible. It may eat against the heart of other men, in anger, all in pressure against the others. It may beat hard, like iron, saying it is independent. But this is only beating against the heart of mankind, not alone.— But either with or against the heart of mankind, or the heart of someone, mother, wife, friend, children—so must the heart of every man beat. It is so.”