“That would be sufficient to set me against him, if I saw much of him,” said Clovis.  “Just imagine at auction bridge, for instance, when one was trying to concentrate one’s mind on what one’s partner’s original declaration had been, and to remember what suits one’s opponents had originally discarded, what it would be like to have some one persistently reminding one of a picture of the youthful David.  It would be simply maddening.  If Eric did that I should detest him.”

“Eric doesn’t play bridge,” said Mrs. Eggelby with dignity.

“Doesn’t he?” asked Clovis; “why not?”

“None of my children have been brought up to play card games,” said Mrs. Eggelby; “draughts and halma and those sorts of games I encourage.  Eric is considered quite a wonderful draughts-player.”

“You are strewing dreadful risks in the path of your family,” said Clovis; “a friend of mine who is a prison chaplain told me that among the worst criminal cases that have come under his notice, men condemned to death or to long periods of penal servitude, there was not a single bridge-player.  On the other hand, he knew at least two expert draughts-players among them.”

“I really don’t see what my boys have got to do with the criminal classes,” said Mrs. Eggelby resentfully.  “They have been most carefully brought up, I can assure you that.”

“That shows that you were nervous as to how they would turn out,” said Clovis.  “Now, my mother never bothered about bringing me up.  She just saw to it that I got whacked at decent intervals and was taught the difference between right and wrong; there is some difference, you know, but I’ve forgotten what it is.”

“Forgotten the difference between right and wrong!” exclaimed Mrs. Eggelby.

“Well, you see, I took up natural history and a whole lot of other subjects at the same time, and one can’t remember everything, can one?  I used to know the difference between the Sardinian dormouse and the ordinary kind, and whether the wry-neck arrives at our shores earlier than the cuckoo, or the other way round, and how long the walrus takes in growing to maturity; I daresay you knew all those sorts of things once, but I bet you’ve forgotten them.”

“Those things are not important,” said Mrs. Eggelby, “but—­”

“The fact that we’ve both forgotten them proves that they are important,” said Clovis; “you must have noticed that it’s always the important things that one forgets, while the trivial, unnecessary facts of life stick in one’s memory.  There’s my cousin, Editha Clubberley, for instance; I can never forget that her birthday is on the 12th of October.  It’s a matter of utter indifference to me on what date her birthday falls, or whether she was born at all; either fact seems to me absolutely trivial, or unnecessary—­I’ve heaps of other cousins to go on with.  On the other hand, when I’m staying with Hildegarde Shrubley I can never remember the important circumstance whether her first husband got his unenviable reputation on the Turf or the Stock Exchange, and that uncertainty rules Sport and Finance out of the conversation at once.  One can never mention travel, either, because her second husband had to live permanently abroad.”