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remained in the drawing-room for only a second:

"I'll go and keep Papa company for a bit," he said.

And he went and looked up his father in his room, where Van der Welcke always smoked his three or four cigarettes after dinner, alone.

"Daddy, am I disturbing you?"

"Disturbing me, my dear fellow? Do you imagine that you ever disturb me? No, you never disturb me. . . . At least, I can count the times when you have disturbed me."

"But I've come to disturb you this time. . . ."

"Well, that's a bit of luck."

"And have a talk with you."

"Good. That doesn't happen often."

Addie knitted his brows, which gave him an expression of sadness:

"Don't be satirical, Father. How can I help it?"

"I'm not being satirical, my dear boy. I accept the inevitable. I've been accepting it now for five days. After dinner I would come up here quietly and smoke my cigarettes in utter resignation. Of those five days, two have been windy and three have been stormy. And I sat here calmly and listened to it all."

"And . . .?"

"And . . . that's all. Life's an insipid business; and the older I grow the more insipid I find it. I don't philosophize about it very much. I never did, you know. . . . But I do sometimes think,