Philip was touched with the painter’s kindness.  All sorts of people were strangely kind to him, he thought.

“It’s awfully good of you, old man, but I’d rather not.”  He held out his hand.  “Good-bye.”

Lawson, troubled by a behaviour which seemed inexplicable, took his hand, and Philip quickly limped away.  His heart was heavy; and, as was usual with him, he began to reproach himself for what he had done:  he did not know what madness of pride had made him refuse the offered friendship.  But he heard someone running behind him and presently Lawson’s voice calling him; he stopped and suddenly the feeling of hostility got the better of him; he presented to Lawson a cold, set face.

“What is it?”

“I suppose you heard about Hayward, didn’t you?”

“I know he went to the Cape.”

“He died, you know, soon after landing.”

For a moment Philip did not answer.  He could hardly believe his ears.

“How?” he asked.

“Oh, enteric.  Hard luck, wasn’t it?  I thought you mightn’t know.  Gave me a bit of a turn when I heard it.”

Lawson nodded quickly and walked away.  Philip felt a shiver pass through his heart.  He had never before lost a friend of his own age, for the death of Cronshaw, a man so much older than himself, had seemed to come in the normal course of things.  The news gave him a peculiar shock.  It reminded him of his own mortality, for like everyone else Philip, knowing perfectly that all men must die, had no intimate feeling that the same must apply to himself; and Hayward’s death, though he had long ceased to have any warm feeling for him, affected him deeply.  He remembered on a sudden all the good talks they had had, and it pained him to think that they would never talk with one another again; he remembered their first meeting and the pleasant months they had spent together in Heidelberg.  Philip’s heart sank as he thought of the lost years.  He walked on mechanically, not noticing where he went, and realised suddenly, with a movement of irritation, that instead of turning down the Haymarket he had sauntered along Shaftesbury Avenue.  It bored him to retrace his steps; and besides, with that news, he did not want to read, he wanted to sit alone and think.  He made up his mind to go to the British Museum.  Solitude was now his only luxury.  Since he had been at Lynn’s he had often gone there and sat in front of the groups from the Parthenon; and, not deliberately thinking, had allowed their divine masses to rest his troubled soul.  But this afternoon they had nothing to say to him, and after a few minutes, impatiently, he wandered out of the room.  There were too many people, provincials with foolish faces, foreigners poring over guide-books; their hideousness besmirched the everlasting masterpieces, their restlessness troubled the god’s immortal repose.  He went into another room and here there was hardly anyone.  Philip sat down wearily.  His nerves were on edge.