“But you’ll go away to-morrow and become more—­more Metropolitan than ever.”

“Ah, Lucia, can’t you leave my poor rag alone?  Do you really think so badly of it?”

“Well, I was prouder of my cousin when he had The Museion.”

“I didn’t ask you what you thought of me.  Perhaps I’m not very proud of myself.”

“I don’t suppose it satisfies your ambition—­I should be sorry if it did.”

“My ambition?  What do you think it was?”

“It was, wasn’t it—­To be a great critic?”

“It depends on what you call great.”

“Well, you came very near it once.”

“When?”

“When you were editor of The Museion.”

He smiled sadly.  “The editor of The Museion, Lucia, was a very little man with a very big conceit of himself.  I admit he made himself pretty conspicuous.  So does every leader of a forlorn hope.”

“Still he led it.  What does the editor of Metropolis lead?”

“Public opinion, dear.  He has—­although you mightn’t think it—­considerable power.”

Lucia was silent.

“He can make—­or kill—­a reputation in twenty-four hours.”

“Does that satisfy your ambition?”

“Yes.  It satisfies my ambition.  But it doesn’t satisfy me.”

“I was afraid it didn’t.”

“You needn’t be afraid, dear; for you know perfectly well what would.”

“Do I know?  Do you know yourself, Horace?”

“Yes, Lucia,” he said gently; “after ten years.  You may not be proud of your cousin—­”

“I used to be proud of him always—­or nearly always.”

“When were you proud of him?”

“When he was himself; when he was sincere.”

“I ought to be very proud of my cousin; for she is pitilessly sincere.”

“Horace—­”

“It is so, dear.  Never mind, you needn’t be proud of me, if you’ll only care—­”

“I have always cared.”

“Or is it—­nearly always?”

“Well—­nearly always.”

“You’re right.  I am insincere, I was insincere when I said you needn’t be proud of me.  I want you, I mean you to be.”

“Do you mean to give up Metropolis, then?”

“Well, no.  That’s asking rather too much.”

“I know it is.”

“Do you hate it so much, Lucia?  I wish you didn’t.”

“I have hated it so much, Horace, that I once wished I had been a rich woman, that you might be”—­she was going to say “an honourable man.”

“What’s wrong with it?  It’s a better paper than the old one.  There are better men on it, and its editor’s a better man.”

“Is he?”

“Yes.  He’s a simpler, humbler person, and—­I should have thought—­more possible to like.”