"Don't give me too much credit for it yet. Like everything else in my life there's a selfish motive back of it. Edith Stevens never said a truer thing than that it is a different matter making light of something which you have and something which you lack. Measuring things up on this basis shows me that nearly every time I've opened my mouth I've put my foot in it. Now I'm going to play safe and make myself very, very wise on some subjects regarding which I've been a bit of a scoffer. Then, if I don't want to, I won't do them, but never again because I can't do them!"
"You needn't be ashamed of your motive; many a man has had one less worthy. But what is your business doing all this time?"
"Well, well, well!" Cosden laughed. "Good old Monty! We've been together nearly an hour, and you are the first to mention business! You wouldn't have believed I could go as long as that without speaking of it, would you? But let me tell you I have them all guessing down at the office. I can see it every day. Of course, I'm keeping my eye on things as much as ever, but I'm not making so much noise about it. You see this is something I have, so I can afford to treat it lightly. Now I have something to measure myself by, and it helps a lot.—But don't let us spend all the time talking about me; what have you been doing with yourself?"
"Drifting, as usual," Huntington replied, regretting that the conversation turned on him; "wishing I might take twenty years off my life and begin over again."
"Why, Monty! You say that so seriously I really believe you mean it! What's happened? It isn't like you."
"Nothing, dear boy, nothing at all," Huntington disclaimed quickly, trying to throw off the mood which had so promptly attracted his friend's attention. "I've seen quite a bit of Billy and his friend Phil Thatcher since I came home, and—I envy them their youth."
Cosden looked at him long and searchingly before he spoke. "You're in a curious mood to-night," he said at length. "During the years I've known you I've never before seen you other than a philosopher, taking life day by day as you found it, and getting all there was out of it."
"What is philosophy unless one can find the stone?" Huntington exclaimed with feeling. "It is the philosopher's stone I want to-night, and I can't get it. I'm feeling my age, Connie, and the sensation isn't agreeable."
"Your age!" Cosden determined to overpower the surprising obsession. "The idea of talking age at forty-five! Out with it, man! Tell me what has taken hold of you. I've left you too much by yourself lately, and it hasn't been a good thing for you."
"That's it, Connie," Huntington smiled weakly. "You mustn't do it again. First you take the heart out of me by declaring that you are going to get married, then you cheer me up by becoming normal again, and lastly you neglect me just as if you had taken the fatal step after all."