“I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do anything these people ask me. Say 'No, no, no, no,' to everybody.”
“In Heaven's name, Simon,” he cried, laying down his pencil, “what has come over you?”
“Old age,” said I.
He uttered his usual interjection, and added that I was only thirty-seven.
“Age is a relative thing,” I remarked. “Babes of five have been known to die of senile decay, and I have seen irresponsible striplings of seventy.”
“I really think Eleanor Faversham had better come back from Sicily.”
I tapped the letter still in my hand. “She's coming.”
“I'm jolly glad to hear it. It's all my silly fault that she went away. I thought she was getting on your nerves. But you want pulling together. That confounded place you've been to has utterly upset you.”
“On the contrary,” said I, “it has steadied and amplified my conception of sublunary affairs. It has shown me that motley is much more profitable wear than the edged toga of the senator—”
“Oh, for God's sake, dry up,” cried young England, “and tell me what answers I'm to give these people!”