Mr. Petre had forgotten all about the Temple, all about Trefusis, all about Charlie Terrard.
South England came flooding into his mind, and an irresistible desire for sleep.
The key clicked in the lock, the door pushed open, and showed a narrow hall of rooms he knew. There was the funny old engraving—a hundred years old at least—of Mostyn Steeplechase, and there, projecting on its bracket so that the narrow hall was made too narrow by it, stuck out at a place that made it positively dangerous, was the bust of Lord Brougham. It was all part of the furniture of his mind. So was the used carpet upon the stair. So was the curtain upon the landing. So was the very smell of the musty house and the outline of the dreary gas bracket which had been fitted with electric light. So was the dusty yellow fringe of stuff which hid the glare of the light from the eye. It was Home. It was his surroundings, the clothing of his soul. He would sleep.
“You want your rooms again?” said Thompson again, heartily.
“Yes,” said Mr. Petre, stopping on the landing and leaning his hand upon the banister and bending his face downward again.
“Good Lord, man!” said his friend, “you’re not puffed by half a dozen stairs!”
“No,” said Mr. Petre. “No.” He groped with his hands as a man does in darkness, but it was a gesture of the mind, not of the body.
Thompson, looking at him queerly for a moment, (but most concernedly, for he loved the man), threw open the door of the room and they both went in. Mr. Petre gave a cry.
Here, came in a flood, all that had supported his being. Here were books, each one he knew; here was the familiar dull aspect of the house opposite, here was the faded looking-glass, and, thrust into it, cards, every one of the names on which he could tell. Here was the chair; and in a rack opposite the looking-glass half a dozen pipes, to one of which he stretched out his hand mechanically. He took it and blew into its stem and was delighted to find it clear. He felt in his pocket for a pouch, and found none. There was no doubt at all that he was at home. He sat down in his own chair, and sighed like a man who has come in full of a good weariness from riding outside upon the Downs. His mind was inhabiting an island, already clear, well lit, the boundaries of which were expanding upon every side.
Yes, these were his rooms. These were his books, his pictures, new and choice, or ugly, old, familiar and inherited; there was the door of the little frowsty bedroom; but he missed something, and then suddenly said to Buffy: