And, turning from him to my old brick friend, I ask: “Would he know me, could he see me, do you think?”
“How should he,” answers the old House, “you are so different to what he would expect. Would you recognise your own ghost, think you?”
“It is sad to think he would not recognise me,” I say.
“It might be sadder if he did,” grumbles the old House.
We both remained silent for awhile; but I know of what the old House is thinking. Soon it speaks as I expected.
“You—writer of stories, why don't you write a book about him? There is something that you know.”
It is the favourite theme of the old House. I never visit it but it suggests to me this idea.
“But he has done nothing?” I say.
“He has lived,” answers the old House. “Is not that enough?”
“Aye, but only in London in these prosaic modern times,” I persist. “How of such can one make a story that shall interest the people?”