The exhausted, worn, and weary figure leaned abruptly forward in its chair. Julian's tired eyes glittered greedily.
"To be happy, I'd commit any crime," he said.
"Crime is merely opinion," Valentine answered. "Everything is opinion.
You will commit crimes probably. Most brave men do."
"But shall I be happy?"
"You are greedy, Julian, greedy of everything, knowledge of life, lust, joy. You are never satisfied. That's because you and I fasted for so long; and the greedy man is never quite happy while he is eating, for he is always anticipating the next course. And, let philosophers say what they will, happiness does not lie in anticipation. Go on eating. Pass on from course to course. At last there will come a time, a beautiful time, when your appetite will be satisfied and you will rest contented. But, remember, not till you have journeyed through the whole menu, played with your dessert and even drunk your black coffee. Go on, only go on. Men and women are unhappy. They think it is because they have done too much. They reproach themselves for a thousand things that they have done. Fools! They are unhappy because they have not done enough. The text which will haunt me on my deathbed will be: 'I have left undone those things which I ought to have done.' Yes, during my long cursed years of inaction, when I was called the Saint of Victoria Street. Ah! Julian, you and I slept; we are awake now. You and I were dead; we are now alive. But we are only at the beginning of our lives. We have those years, those white and empty years, to drown in the waters of Lethe. They are like monstrous children that should have been strangled almost ere they were born, white, vacant children. And now, day by day, we are pressing them down in the waters with our hands. At last they will sink. The waves will flow over their haggard faces. The waves will sweep them away. Then we shall be happy. We shall redeem those years on which the locust fed, and we shall be happy."
"Yes, by God, we shall be happy, we will—we will be happy. Only teach me to be happy, Valentine, anywhere, anyhow."
"Not with the lady of the feathers. She will not make you happy."
"Cuckoo? No! For she's terribly unhappy herself. Poor old Cuckoo. I wonder what she's doing now."
"Searching in the snow for her fate," Valentine said, with a sneer.
* * * * *