"Another two days and I'm done with this place," he thought. Then Murdoch Temple came to see him. Westcott had known Temple before the war; he had not seen him for five years. Temple had not altered: there was the same slight, delicate body, pale, discontented face, jet-black hair, long, nervous and conceited hands, shabby clothes too tight for the body and most characteristic of all, a melancholy and supercilious curl to his upper lip. Temple was supercilious by nature and melancholy by profession. From the very beginning it had seemed that he was destined to be a genius, and although after fifteen years of anticipation the fulfilment of that destiny was still postponed, no one could doubt, least of all Temple himself, that the day of recognition was approaching. At Oxford it had seemed that there was nothing that he could not do; in actual fact he had since then read much French and some Russian (in translation, of course), edited two little papers, strangled by an unsympathetic public almost at birth, produced a novel, a poem, and a book of criticism. An unhappy chill had hung over all these things. The war, in whose progress poor health had forbidden him to take a very active part, had made of him a pessimist and pacifist; but even here a certain temperamental weakness had forbidden him to be too ardent. He was peevish rather than indignant, petulant rather than angry, unkind rather than cruel, malicious rather than unjust, and, undoubtedly, a little sycophantic.
He had a brain, but he had always used it for the fostering of discontent. He did care, with more warmth than one would have supposed possible, for literature, but everything in it must be new, and strange, and unsuccessful. Success was, to him, the most terrible of all things, unless he himself were to attain it.
That, as things now went, seemed unlikely. During the last two years he and his friends had been anticipating all that they were going to do "after the war...." There was to be a new literature, a new poetry, a new novel, a new criticism; and all these were to be built up by Temple and company. "Thank God, the war's saved us from the old mess we were in. No more Robsarts and Manisbys for us! Now we shall see!"
Peter had heard vague rumours of the things these young men were going to do. He had not been greatly interested. He was outside their generation, and his own ambitions were long deadened by his own self-contempt. Nevertheless, on this particular morning, he was glad to see Temple. There was no question but that he made as effective a contrast with Robsart as one could find.
Temple was extremely cordial. At the same time, he was frankly surprised to find Peter there.
"How did you track me?" asked Peter.
"Robsart told Maradick in Edinburgh, Meredith was writing to me. How are you after all this time?"
"All right," said Peter, smiling. The conversation then was literary, and Temple explained "how things were." Things were very bad. He used the glories of Robsart's rooms as an illustration of his purpose. He waved his hands about. "Look at these things," he seemed to say. "At these temples of gold, this china of great price, these pictures, and then look at me. Here is the contrast between true and false art."
"We want to get rid," he explained to Peter, "of all these false valuations. This wretched war has shown us at least one thing—the difference between the true and the false. The world is in pieces. It is for us to build it up again."