And he sat down again with a radiant expression.
Philip lit his pipe, and drew his chair near the fire, listening idly to the light scratchings of the writing and the heavy scratchings of the erasures.
"You seem to scratch out a lot, Dale," he remarked.
"A thing's no good," said Dale, without turning round, "till you've scratched it all out twice at least."
"It's a pity, then," said Philip, pulling at his pipe and looking into the fire, "that we aren't allowed to treat life like that."
His words struck a chord in Dale's memory. He started up, and repeated:
"The moving Finger writes, and having writ
Moves on, nor all your piety nor wit
Can lure it back to cancel half a line,
Nor all your tears wash out a word of it."