CHAPTER III
“RUN ON BOHEMIAN LINES!”
Sebastian owned a hundred pounds per annum, bequeathed him by legacy; which sum Stuart had induced him to retain:
“I agree with you it would be far more effective to renounce that as well, and confront the world as the penniless son of the rich Ned Levi. But it isn’t done, my lad; if it were, I shouldn’t be trading in diamonds. Theatricality is only a species of fat. If you strip yourself because it gives opportunity for your dramatic faculties, you’re feeding hard, all the time; feeding on the astounded faces of your friends, on your own ringing accents, on the picturesque contrast of your life as it was yesterday to what it will be to-morrow. You mustn’t be picturesque, Levi, your tawny locks are against you as it is. Your forty bob a week will ensure you a pleasantly mediocre existence in a furnished bed-sitting-room.”
Sebastian looked worried; he wished Stuart would not exhibit so many mental acrobatics. Last week he could have sworn the man was preaching total renunciation of all worldly goods, in order to make the struggle as strenuous as possible. Now he had doubled and twisted again to something entirely different. And beyond all the inconsistencies, Sebastian glimpsed a splendid consistency, a paramount truth, but, as usual, too high up for him to do aught but cling to it by the finger-tips. And seemingly he had blundered already.
“I’ve given up my room at the hotel, and I think I’ll go to the Farme for the rest of August and September,” he announced tentatively; “it’s not expensive, and I shall be near Letty.” He might have added: “and near you.”
—“And it will be quiet for writing,” he continued.
“What do you intend to write?”
“I want to throw your theory of the shears into a book; in fact, all your theories.” Sebastian tried to make the announcement without blushing, and failed miserably.