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 Freddy's boyishness fell away, and a wry smile crossed his face. "Well, as a matter of fact, I was, rather. Makes a man feel an infernal rotter to get a decent note like this after having assumed—well, you know."

Freddy had taken Gritty at her own easy valuation, and his superior worth had put her on her mettle. It had been a good lesson for both, Paul mused.

"Splendid woman," Freddy repeated, and said good-night.

Suddenly Paul felt more poignantly alone than he had felt for years. Twice in the course of a few hours, Gritty Kestrell—that little baggage—had revealed qualities that chastened him. He thought of himself as a shell, stuffed with words, words, words, light as a meringue.

The doors of the hotel had been fastened. He went to the switch and turned down the last lights, leaving the lounge in darkness except for the red reflection of the dying fire and the blue moonlight at the windows. He had an impulse to put on his top coat and wander back to the desert, to wait for sunrise. But as he walked to the windows his feet, against the sides of his shoes, ached in protest.

Instinctively he moved toward the piano, and for the first time in years dropped into the tranquil rhythm of the old sonata he had played in Fremantle. As he played he was conscious of the phenomenon concerning which he had philosophized earlier in the evening: that a watching faculty stood aloof and described his lonely mood for him, a faculty which there was no escaping. It told him his life was still aimless. The theme had not changed, but he had missed opportunities of developing it, had been content to luxuriate in mere tone-colour. Others went on year by year lending their voices to the great chorus, while his life remained a feeble solo, at times inaudible even to himself. On a few occasions,