"Have you thought of the future—of what you are going to do?" she asked.
"No," said he, "but I have faith in my destiny."
Zora felt this to be magnificent, but scarcely practical.
"You'll be without resources?"
"I never realized how full empty pockets could be," he declared.
They were walking across the common, Sypher having lunched at "The Nook." Presently they came across Septimus sitting by the pond. He rose and greeted them. He wore an overcoat buttoned up to the throat and a cloth cap. Zora's quick eyes noted an absence of detail in his attire.
"Why, you're not dressed! Oh, you do want a wife to look after you."
"I've only just got up," he explained, "and Wiggleswick wanted to do out my bedroom, so I hadn't time to find my studs. I was thinking all night, you see, and one can't think and sleep at the same time."
"A new invention?" laughed Zora.
"No. The old ones. I was trying to count them up. I've taken out about fifty patents, and there are heaps of things half worked out which might be valuable. Now I was thinking that if I made them all over to Sypher he might get in some practical fellow to set them right, and start companies and things to work them, and so make a lot of money."