sometimes he forgot it.  His hostess asked him a great many questions about himself, but on this subject he was an indifferent talker.  He was not what is called subjective, though when he felt that her interest was sincere, he made an almost heroic attempt to be.  He told her a great many things he had done, and regaled her with anecdotes of Western life; she was from Philadelphia, and with her eight years in Paris, talked of herself as a languid Oriental.  But some other person was always the hero of the tale, by no means always to his advantage; and Newman’s own emotions were but scantily chronicled.  She had an especial wish to know whether he had ever been in love—­seriously, passionately—­and, failing to gather any satisfaction from his allusions, she at last directly inquired.  He hesitated a while, and at last he said, “No!” She declared that she was delighted to hear it, as it confirmed her private conviction that he was a man of no feeling.

“Really?” he asked, very gravely.  “Do you think so?  How do you recognize a man of feeling?”

“I can’t make out,” said Mrs. Tristram, “whether you are very simple or very deep.”

“I’m very deep.  That’s a fact.”

“I believe that if I were to tell you with a certain air that you have no feeling, you would implicitly believe me.”

“A certain air?” said Newman.  “Try it and see.”

“You would believe me, but you would not care,” said Mrs. Tristram.

“You have got it all wrong.  I should care immensely, but I shouldn’t believe you.  The fact is I have never had time to feel things.  I have had to do them, to make myself felt.”

“I can imagine that you may have done that tremendously, sometimes.”

“Yes, there’s no mistake about that.”

“When you are in a fury it can’t be pleasant.”

“I am never in a fury.”

“Angry, then, or displeased.”

“I am never angry, and it is so long since I have been displeased that I have quite forgotten it.”

“I don’t believe,” said Mrs. Tristram, “that you are never angry.  A man ought to be angry sometimes, and you are neither good enough nor bad enough always to keep your temper.”

“I lose it perhaps once in five years.”

“The time is coming round, then,” said his hostess.  “Before I have known you six months I shall see you in a fine fury.”

“Do you mean to put me into one?”

“I should not be sorry.  You take things too coolly.  It exasperates me.  And then you are too happy.  You have what must be the most agreeable thing in the world, the consciousness of having bought your pleasure beforehand and paid for it.  You have not a day of reckoning staring you in the face.  Your reckonings are over.”

“Well, I suppose I am happy,” said Newman, meditatively.

“You have been odiously successful.”

“Successful in copper,” said Newman, “only so-so in railroads, and a hopeless fizzle in oil.”