too well; something like mine, I expect—­a cosy room with a clean cloth and a well-cooked chop and potato.  I’ve cooked ’em myself before now—­the former on a shovel, the latter in an empty meat-tin.  Of course I know that Stafford and you, Mr. Howard, have lived very different lives to mine.  Of course.  You have been accustomed to every refinement and a great deal of luxury over since you left the cradle.  Quite right!  I’m delighted that it should be so.  Nothing is too good for Stafford here—­and his chum—­nothing!”

Stafford’s handsome face flushed.

“You’ve been very generous to me, sir,” he said, in his brief way, but with a glance at his father which expressed more than the words.

Sir Stephen threw his head back and laughed.

“That’s all right, Staff,” he said.  “It’s been a pleasure to me.  I just wanted to see you happy—­’see you’ is rather inappropriate, though, isn’t it, considering how very little I have seen you?  But there were reasons—­We won’t go into that.  Where was I?”

“You were telling us your reasons for building this place, sir,” Howard reminded him quietly.

Sir Stephen shot a glance at him, a cautious glance.

“Was I?  By George! then I am more communicative than usual.  My friends in the city and elsewhere would tell you that I never give any reasons.  But what I was saying was this:  that I’ve learnt that the world likes tinsel and glitter—­just as the Sioux Indians are caught by glass beads and lengths of Turkey red calico.  And I give the world what it wants.  See?”

He laughed, a laugh which was as cynical as Howard’s.

“The world is not so much an oyster which you’ve got to open with a sword, as the old proverb has it, but a wild beast.  Yes, a wild beast:  and you’ve got to fight him at first, fight him tooth and claw.  When you’ve beaten him, ah! then you’ve got to feed him.”

“You have beaten your wild beast, Sir Stephen,” remarked Howard.

“Well—­yes, more or less; anyhow, he seemed ready to come to my hand for the tit-bits I can give him.  The world likes to be feted, likes good dinners and high-class balls; but above all it likes to be amused.  I’m going to give it what it wants.”

Stafford looked up.  This declaration coming from his father jarred upon Stafford, whose heart he had won.

“Why should you trouble, sir?” he said, quietly.  “I should have thought you would have been satisfied.”

“Because I want something more from it; something in return,” said Sir Stephen, with a smile.  “Satisfied?  No man is satisfied.  I’ve an ambition yet ungratified, and I mean to gratify it.  You think I’m vaunting, Mr. Howard?” “No, I think you are simply stating a fact,” responded Howard, gravely.

“I thank you, sir,” said Sir Stephen, as gravely.  “I speak so confidently because I see my way clearly before me.  I generally do.  When I don’t, I back out and lie low.”