not be permanent, but this he had understood to be merely a delicate way of referring to his former imperfect record of sobriety.  And he had become rich not only in money but in time.  Rickman’s had demanded an eight or even a ten hours’ day; the office of The Museion claimed him but five hours of four days in the week.  From five o’clock on Thursday evening till eleven on Monday morning, whatever work remained for him to do could be done in his own time and his own temper.

Much of the leisure time at his disposal he spent in endeavouring to follow the Harden library in its dispersion.  He attended the great auctions in the hope of intercepting some treasure in its passage from Rickman’s to the home of the collector.  Once, in his father’s absence, he bought a dozen volumes straight over the counter from his successor there.  It was also about this time that Spinks and Soper appeared in the new character of book fanciers, buying according to Rickman’s instructions and selling to him on commission, a transaction which filled these gentlemen with superb importance.  Thus Rickman became possessed of about twenty or thirty volumes which he ranged behind a curtain, on a shelf apart.  The collection, formed gradually, included nothing of any intrinsic value; such as it was he treasured it with a view to restoring it ultimately to Lucia Harden.  He was considering whether with the means at his disposal he could procure a certain Aldine Dante of his memory, when the Harden library disappeared from the market as suddenly and mysteriously as it had come.  No volume belonging to it could be bought for love or money; and none were displayed in the windows of Rickman’s.  Keith learnt nothing by his inquiries beyond the extent of his estrangement from his father.  When he called at the shop his successor regretted that he was unable to give him any information.  When he visited the suburban villa Isaac refused to see him.  When he wrote Isaac never answered the letters.  His stepmother in an unpleasant interview gave him to understand that the separation was final and complete.

He would have been more hurt by this rupture but for that other and abiding pain.  The thought of Lucia Harden checked his enjoyment in the prospect of a now unimpeded career.  Rickman was like some young athlete who walks on to the field stripped and strong for the race, but invisibly handicapped, having had the heart knocked out of him by some shameful incident outside the course.  Apart from his own disgrace he was miserably anxious about Lucia herself, about her health, her happiness, her prospects; his misery being by no means lightened by his perception that these things were not exactly his concern.