'Or perhaps in a little set of verses—thrown off,' murmured Arty Kane.
'Who's talking about tragedies?' called Peggy from the other end. 'Elfreda and Horace are splendidly happy. So will Trix and Airey be.'
'And—I am sorry to mention it,' smiled Tommy Trent, 'but the latter couple will also be uncommonly well off.'
'The only touch of poetry the thing ever had, gone out of it!' grumbled Arty resentfully.
'Listen to the voice of the Philistine!' advised Miles, pointing at Tommy. 'For the humiliating reason that he's generally right.'
'No!' ejaculated Mrs. John firmly.
'That is, we shall all come to think him right. Time will corrupt us. We shall sink into marriage, merit, middle age, and, conceivably, money. In a few years we sha'n't be able to make out for the lives of us what the dickens the young fools do want.'
'Is this a séance?' demanded Arty Kane indignantly. 'If the veil of the future is going to be lifted, I'm off home.'
'Fancy bothering about what we shall be in ten years!' cried Peggy scornfully, 'when such a lot of fine things are sure to happen in between! Besides, I don't believe that anything of the sort need happen at all.'
The idea rather scandalised Mrs. John. It seemed to cut at the root of a scientific view of life—a thing that she flattered herself might with due diligence be discovered in her published, and was certainly to be developed in her projected, works.