'You continued,' Elsie interrupted quickly, 'to work at your profession, though you took up other studies.'
'No—no—not quite that.'
'You began to take up Social problems, and gradually abandoned your profession.'
'No—no—not that either—quite.'
'You found you could not reconcile your conscience any longer to defending Property.'
'No—I forget exactly. It is strange that one should forget a thing so simple. I am growing old, I suppose.—Well—it matters not. I left the profession. That is the only important thing to remember. That I did so these Chambers prove. I came out of it. Yes, that was it. Just at the moment, my head being full of other things, I cannot remember the exact time, or the manner of my leaving the profession. I forget the circumstances, probably because I attached so little importance to it. The real point is that I came out of it and gave myself up to these studies.'
She noted this important point carefully and looked up for more.
'There, my dear child, is my whole life for you. Without an incident or an episode. I was born: I went to school: I became a solicitor: I gave up my profession: I studied social economy: I made my great discovery: I preached it. Then—did I say my life was without an episode and without love? No—no—I was wrong. My daughter—I have at last found love and a child—and a disciple. What more have I to ask?'
'My Master!' No daughter could be more in sympathy with him than this girl.
'It is all most valuable and interesting,' she said, 'though the facts are so few. Books will be written, in the future, on these facts, which will be filled out with conjecture and inference. Even the things that you think of so little importance will be made the subject of comment and criticism. Well—but my Biography of you will be the first and best and most important. I shall first make a skeleton life out of the facts, and then fill in the flesh and blood and put on the clothes, and present you, dear Master, just as you are.'