“Very good, very good.  Now listen to me.  You’re on the roads, aren’t you, without a penny, you and your boy?”

“Yes.  I make a little as I go along, you know.  One doesn’t need much here.  We’re quite comfortable.”

“Are you, indeed?...  Well now, I see no reason why you shouldn’t be more comfortable still.  I want you to come and live with me.”

Peter startled, looked up, and coloured.  Then he smiled.

“It’s most frightfully good of you....”

“Rubbish, rubbish.”  Lord Evelyn testily waved his words aside. “’Tisn’t for your sake.  It’s for mine.  I want your company....  My good boy, haven’t you ever guessed, all these years, that I rather like your company?  That was why I was so angry when you and your precious brother made a fool of me long ago.  It hurt, because I liked you, Peter Margerison.  That was why I couldn’t forgive you.  Demme!  I don’t think I’ve forgiven you yet, nor ever shall.  That is why I came and insulted you so badly one day as you remember.  That’s why I’ve such a soft place for Lucy, who’s got your laugh and your voice and your tricks of talk, and looks at me with your white face.  That’s why I wasn’t going to let her and you make young fools of yourselves together.  That, I suppose, is why I know all the time what you’re feeling; why I knew you were in hell all last summer; why I saw you, though I’m such a blinde bat now, last night, when neither Denis nor Lucy did.  And that’s why I want you and your boy to come and keep me company now, till the end.”

Peter put out his hand and took Lord Evelyn’s.

“I don’t know what I can say to thank you.  I do appreciate it, you know, more than anything that’s ever happened to me before.  I can’t think how you can be so awfully nice to me....”

“Enough, enough,” said Lord Evelyn.  “Will you or won’t you?  Yes or no?”

Peter at that gave his answer quickly.

“No.  I can’t, you know.”

Lord Evelyn turned on him sharply.

“You won’t?  The devil take it!”

“It’s like this,” said Peter, disturbed and apologetic, “we don’t want to lead what’s called respectable lives, Thomas and I. We don’t want to be well-off—­to live with well-off people.  We—­we can’t, d’you see.  It’s not the way we’re made.  We don’t belong.  We’re meant just to drift about the bottom, like this, and pick up a living anyhow.”

“The boy’s a fool,” remarked Lord Evelyn, throwing back his head and staring at the roof.

Peter, who hated to wound, went on, “If we could share the life of any rich person, it would be you.”

“Good Lord, I’m not rich.  Wish I were.  Rich!”