“But even that wouldn’t have dished him, if he’d had a passion for anybody; or if he’d cared two straws about metaphysical truth. Your truth, Spalding.”
“Bless me, all our preconceived ideas seem to have been wrong.”
“Yes. Even I wasn’t prepared for that. By the way, that’s what you got in on, your passion for truth. It’s like my passion for beauty.”
“But—aren’t you distressed about your father, Jeffreson?”
“Oh, no. He’ll get into some heaven or other some day. He’ll find out that he cares for somebody, perhaps. Then he’ll be all right— But don’t you want to look about a bit?”
“I don’t see very much to look at. It strikes me as a bit bare, your heaven.”
“Oh, that’s because you’re only at the landing-state.”
“The landing what?”
“State. What we used to call landing place. Times and spaces here, you know, are states. States of mind.”
Mr. Spalding sat up, excited. “But—but that’s what I always said they were. I and Kant.”